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THE    HIBBERT    LECTURES 

SECOND    SERIES 
1913 


/  . 


THE   H IB  BERT  LECTURES /^p"  "'^ 

SECOND   SERIES  |         JUL  9?!  1914 


THE 

EARLY  DEVELOPMENT 
OF    MOHAMMEDANISM 


LECTURES 

DELIVERED  IN  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  LONDON 

MAY  AND  JUNE  1913 


/ 


BY 


D.  S.   MARGOLIOUTH,  D.Litt. 

FELLOW   OF   NEW   COLLEGE   AND    LAUDIAN    PROFESSOR   OF    ARABIC   IN   THE 

UNIVERSITY   OF    OXFORD 


NEW  YORK 

CHARLES  SCRIBNER'S  SONS 

597/599  FIFTH  AVENUE 
1914 


PREFACE 

The  following  lectures  were  delivered  in  the  months 
of  May  and  June  1913,  in  the  University  of  London, 
at  the  request  of  the  Hibbert  Trustees,  to  whom 
the  writer  wishes  at  the  outset  to  express  his  cordial 
thanks,  both  for  selecting  the  subject  of  Mohammed- 
anism and  committing  the  treatment  of  it  to  him. 
Professor  Goldziher  in  his  LiCctures  on  Islam^  has 
provided  guidance  for  all  who  wish  to  handle  this 
theme  ;  the  topic  chosen  by  the  present  writer  might 
be  called  "  the  supplementing  of  the  Koran,"  i.e.  the 
process  whereby  the  ex  tempore,  or  indeed  ex  momento, 
utterances  thrown  together  in  that  volume  were 
worked  into  a  fabric  which  has  marvellously  resisted 
the  ravages  of  time. 

The  materials  employed  for  these  lectures  are  to 
a  small  extent  unpublished  MSS.,^  but  in  the  main 
recently  published  works  of  early  Islamic  authors. 
Of  three  among  the  most  eminent  of  these  the 
writer  is  simultaneously  publishing  for  the  first  time 

1  Vorlesungen  iiher  den  Islam,  Heidelberg,  1910. 

2  The  chief  of  these  are  the  works  of  MuhasibT,  employed  in 
Lecture  V. ;  the  Mawdkif  of  NifFarl,  from  which  select  translations 
are  given  in  Lecture  VL  ;  and  the  monograph  of  Ibn  ^Asakir  on 
Abu'l-Hasan  al-Ash^ari,  which  has  been  used  for  Lecture  VIL 

V 


vi    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

authentic  and  copious  biographies  from  a  MS.  in 
his  possession,  through  the  Hberality  of  the  Gibb 
Trustees.^  The  works  of  one  of  them,  the  jurist 
Shafi*i,  were  printed  by  Cairene  scholars  in  the  years 
1903-1907 ;  the  light  which  they  throw  on  the 
history  of  Islamic  jurisprudence  is  brilliant.  Their 
publication  was  immediately  preceded  by  that  of  the 
works  ascribed  to  Shafi'i's  teacher  Malik,  himself 
the  founder  of  a  law-school ;  and  these,  too,  are  of 
the  greatest  utility.  This  year  has  seen  the  com- 
pletion of  a  Corpus  Juris  on  a  still  vaster  scale 
belonging  to  the  school  of  Abu  Hanifah,  but 
compiled  three  centuries  after  his  time ;  this,  though 
highly  instructive,  is  no  substitute  for  the  work  of 
the  founder.  The  biography  of  Shafi'i  certainly 
helps  the  appreciation  and  possibly  the  understanding 
of  his  treatises. 

Of  the  other  two  authors,  Jahiz  and  Tabari,  the 
works  have  been  issued  partly  by  Eastern,  partly 
by  Western  scholars.  Each  of  these  is  a  mine  of 
information,  and,  like  Shafi'i,  takes  us  into  the 
atmosphere  wherein  Islam  developed. 

In  Lecture  IV.,  which  deals  with  the  condition 
of  the  "  protected  communities,"  considerable  use 
has  been  made  of  later  authorities ;  elsewhere  the 
writer  has  usually  endeavoured  to  keep  within  the 
third,  with  occasional  extension  into  the  fourth. 
Islamic  century.  M.  Massignon's  interesting  edition 
of  a  work  by  Hallaj  enables  us  to  follow  Sufism 
into   a   period   near   its   rise ;    the    account   of  this 

1  Yakut's  Dictionary  oj  Learned  Me7i,  vol.  vi. 


PREFACE  vii 

subject  given  in  Lecture  V.  is  mainly  based  on  the 
Kut  al-Kulub  of  Abu  Talib  al-Mekkl,  of  the  middle 

•  •  • 

fourth  century  of  Islam,  published  some  twenty 
years  ago.  Lecture  VI L  contains  material  drawn 
from  the  Ibanah,  ascribed  to  Abu'l-Hasan  al-Ash*ari, 
of  which  the  genuineness  seems  to  be  attested  by 
Ibn  'Asakir;  it  was  printed  some  ten  years  ago  in 
Hyderabad.  Another  text  printed  in  the  same 
place,  the  Dalail  al-Nubuwwah  of  Abu  Nu'aim, 
has  furnished  material  for  Lecture  VIII. 

Thioughout,  an  acquaintance  with  the  elements  of 
the  subject,  such  as  can  be  obtained  from  the  writer's 
manuals,^  has  been  assumed  in  the  reader ;  in  order, 
however,  to  render  the  Lectures  intelligible  by 
themselves,  all  allusions  which  could  occasion  any 
difficulty  have  been  explained  in  the  Index. 

The  writer  terminates  this  Preface  with  a  tribute 
of  gratitude  to  those  Mohammedan  scholars  in  Egypt 
and  India  who  during  the  last  few  years  have  put 
into  our  hands  so  many  texts  of  the  highest  import- 
ance for  the  study  of  Arabic  antiquity ;  and  another 
to  the  audiences  who  deemed  these  lectures  worthy 
of  their  attention. 

Oxford,  December  1913.  ' 

A  Mohammedanism,  in  the  "  Home  University  Library,"  and 
Mohammed  and  the  Rise  of  Islam  in  the  series  "  Heroes  of  the 
Nations." 


\ 


/ 


CONTENTS 

LECTURE  PAGE 

I.  THE  KORAN  AS  THE  BASIS  OF  ISLAM           .  1 

n.  THE  SAME  CONTINUED  ....  36 

III.  THE  LEGAL  SUPPLEMENT         .            .            .  65 

IV.  THE  STATUS  OF  THE  TOLERATED  CULTS    .  99 

V.  THE     DEVELOPMENT     OF     MOHAMMEDAN 

ETHICS      .  .  .  .  .  .135 

VI.  ASCETICISM  LEADING  TO  PANTHEISM           .  l67 

VII.  THE  PHILOSOPHICAL  SUPPLEMENT  .             .  201 

VIII.  THE  HISTORICAL  SUPPLEMENT                        .  230 

INDEX           .......  259 


IX 


f 


THE 

EARLY  DEVELOPMENT 
OF    MOHAMMEDANISM 

LECTURE  I 

THE    KORAN    AS    THE    BASIS    OF    ISLAM 

It  is  a  noteworthy  fact  about  the  Mohamniedan 
system  that  since  the  Migration  it  has  demanded  no 
quahfications  for  admission  to  its  brotherhood.  To 
those  who  are  outside  its  pale  it  in  theory  offers  no 
faciUties  whatever  for  the  study  of  its  nature ;  a  man 
must  enroll  himself  as  a  member  first,  and  then  only 
may  he  learn  what  his  obligations  are.  The  Koran 
may  not  be  sold  to  Unbelievers  ;  soldiers  are  advised 
not  to  take  it  with  them  into  hostile  territory  for  fear 
the  Unbeliever  should  get  hold  of  it ;  and  many  a 
copy  bears  upon  it  a  warning  to  Unbelievers  not  to 
touch.  Pious  grammarians  have  refused  to  teach 
grammar  to  Jews  or  Christians,  because  the  rules 
were  apt  to  be  illustrated  by  quotations  from  the 
sacred  volume.  The  Unbeliever  is  by  one  of  the 
codes  ^  forbidden  to  enter  a  mosque ;  and  even  when 

1  Malik.     ^eeBaidawii.  10,  12. 

1  1 


2     EARLY   DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDANISM 

permission  is  granted  him  to  do  so,  he  is  an  un- 
welcome guest.  The  crowning  ceremony  of  Islam, 
the  Pilgrimage,  may  be  witnessed  by  no  Unbeliever ; 
the  penalty  for  intrusion  is  death. 

It  follows  that  such  periods  of  instruction  and 
probation  as  are  enjoined  by  some  other  systems  upon 
neophytes  are  unknown  to  Islam ;  and  indeed  there 
is  no  occasion  for  them.  Their  purpose  is  to  test  the 
neophyte's  sincerity  in  the  first  place,  and  his  moral 
worthiness  in  the  second.  Against  insincerity  the 
system  is  sufficiently  armed  by  the  principle  that 
whosoever  abandons  Islam  forfeits  his  life ;  there  is 
then  little  danger  of  men  joining  for  some  dishonest 
purpose  and  quitting  the  community  when  that 
purpose  has  been  served.  A  Moslem  who  is  in  peril 
of  his  life  may  indeed  simulate  perversion,  and  no 
difficulty  is  made  about  readmitting  the  repentant 
pervert ;  but  where  Islam  can  be  safely  professed  the 
pervert  cannot  legally  hope  to  be  spared.  And  it 
follows  from  this  principle  that  martyrdom  in  Islam 
means  something  very  diffisrent  from  what  it  means 
to  the  Christian.  The  Christian  martyr  is  the  man 
who  dies  professing  his  faith,  but  not  resisting ;  the 
Moslem  martyr  is  one  who  dies  for  his  faith  on  the 
battle-field  ;  more  often  in  endeavouring  to  force  it 
upon  others  than  defending  his  own  exercise  thereof. 
For  his  sacred  book  expressly  permits  him  to  refrain 
from  confessing  where  confession  will  result  in  death 
or  torment. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  maxim  that  Islam  cancels 
all   that    was   before   it   renders    moral  qualification 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM  3 

unnecessary.  Only  after  the  man  has  joined  the 
community  do  his  acts  begin  to  count.  Whatever 
he  may  have  done  before  joining  may  bear  some 
analogy  to  the  keeping  or  to  the  breaking  of  a 
commandment  ;  but  it  is  not  the  same  thing.  Un- 
believers on  the  Day  of  Judgment  are  to  be  asked 
two  questions  only  :  why  they  associated  other  beings 
with  the  Almighty,  and  if  Apostles  were  sent  them 
why  they  repudiated  them.  The  only  thing  that  is 
incumbent  upon  them,  the  only  duty  wherewith  God 
has  charged  them,  is  to  study  the  evidence  of  Islam  ;^ 
or  let  us  rather  say,  to  accept  Islam,  since  they  have 
no  access  to  the  evidences.  They  may  by  their  good 
qualities  win  the  friendship  or  even  the  affection  of 
Moslems,  but  they  are  destined  to  Hell-Fire  not- 
withstanding. An  author  of  the  third  century  a.h., 
who  quotes  verses  in  praise  of  Jews,  Christians,  and 
Mazdians,  shows  that  even  encomiasts  make  no 
concealment  of  this  fact.'^  A  Jewish  or  Christian 
physician  may  be  useful  to  a  Moslem,  but  is  none 
the  less  the  enemy  of  Allah.  ^ 

It  follows,  then,  that  Islam  has  to  be  preached^ 
with  the  sword,  for  without  going  into  the  water  one 
cannot  learn  to  swim,  and  there  is  no  probationary 
dip.  If  the  convincing  miracle  of  Islam  be  the 
Koran,  which  outdoes  all  other  compositions  in 
eloquence,  the  persons  who  are  to  be  convinced  by 
this  miracle  must  have  the  opportunity  of  studying  it 
in  order  to  be  convinced.     This  is  so  obvious  that 

1  Al-Fark,  p.  107. 

2  Jahiz,  Hayawan  v.  52. 


4     EARLY   DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDANISM 

some  jurists  are  inclined  to  make  an  exception  in 
favour  of  a  few  texts,  sufficient  to  give  the  inquirer 
a  notion  of  its  contents ;  and  they  can  quote  the 
precedent  of  the  Prophet,  who  in  his  imperious 
message  to  all  peoples,  nations,  and  languages,  com- 
manding them  to  adopt  Islam  if  they  wished  for 
safety,  introduced  a  text  from  the  sacred  volume. 
It  is  clear,  however,  that  the  same  objection  must 
really  apply  to  one  text  as  to  a  number ;  it  would  be 
impossible  to  fix  a  limit  at  which  the  volume  became 
esoteric.  No,  let  people  pay  homage  to  it  first, 
recognise  that  it  is  the  divine  revelation,  and  then 
they  may,  or  indeed  must,  study  it.  But  such  recog- 
nition can  only  be  extorted  by  force,  if  the  right  to 
examine  is  denied.  And  if  methods  are  to  be  judged 
by  their  results,  no  one  with  Mohammed's  experience 
would  have  regarded  argument  as  an  expedient  for 
conversion  comparable  with  the  sword.  He  argued 
for  thirteen  years  and  made  converts  by  the  unit  or 
the  decade  ;  he  drew  the  sword  and  won  them  by  the 
hundred  and  the  thousand.  Twenty  years  of  fighting 
effected  more  than  a  thousand  years  of  pleading  and 
arguing  would  effect.  But  just  as  the  argument  of 
reason  is  apt  to  be  weakened  if  the  sword  be  behind 
it,  so  the  argument  of  the  sword  is  not  strengthened 
by  the  fact  that  the  other  form  of  reasoning  has  been 
tried  in  vain.  Hence  the  periods  of  inquiry  and 
probation  are  not  desirable. 

Now  this  peculiarity  of  Islam  is  closely  connected 
with  the  history  of  the  system.  In  the  first  place,  it 
began  as  a  secret  society,  and  even  now,  if  novelists 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM  5 

may  be  believed,  the  secret  society  has  a  tendency 
to  work  upon  the  same  theory.  It  cannot  live  or 
succeed  without  a  steady  accretion  of  members  ;  on 
the  other  hand,  its  purposes  can  only  be  communicated 
to  the  loyal.  It  is  therefore  necessary  that  members 
should  be  committed  to  the  programme  of  the  society 
before  they  know  what  it  is. 

In  the  second  place,  the  claim  of  Mohammed, 
though  he  may  have  formulated  it  differently  at 
different  times,  was  to  be  the  channel  whereby  the 
Almighty  communicated  His  behests  to  mankind,  or 
at  least  to  some  of  the  Arabs.  The  two  articles  of 
the  Moslem  faith  are  reciprocally  involved :  unless 
Allah  were  the  sole  ruler  of  the  community,  the 
importance  attaching  to  His  messenger  would  be 
smaller ;  the  importance  of  the  messenger  of  Allah 
is  a  corollary  of  the  unity  of  Allah.  Allah  issues 
orders  through  the  Prophet ;  that  is  the  meaning  of 
the  Islamic  creed.  Those  orders  may  concern  ritual 
or  conduct  or  politics  ;  and  from  the  nature  of  human 
life,  with  fresh  questions  ever  arising,  those  orders  are 
likely  to  be  occasional  ;  whence  the  title  "  occasions 
of  revelation,"  given  to  works  which  deal  with  the 
chronology  of  the  Koran,  accurately  expresses  its 
nature. 

It  is  this  fact  which  explains  and  even  excuses 
the  carelessness  with  regard  to  the  Koran  which  is 
historically  attested  of  both  the  Prophet  and  his  Com- 
panions. •'  When  the  Prophet  died,"  we  are  told 
by  a  preacher,  "  he  left  twenty  thousand  Companions 
who  had  not  done  more  than  glance  at  the  Koran, 


6      EARLY   DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDANISM 

and  only  six  who  knew  the  whole  by  heart — two  of 
these  being  doubtful  cases."  "  A  Companion  of  the 
Prophet  who  knew  by  heart  a  long  Surah,  or  a 
seventh  of  the  Koran,  counted  as  a  marvel."  It 
would  be  truer  to  say  that  there  was  scarcely  a 
Companion  of  the  Prophet  who  would  even  have 
claimed  to  know  the  whole  by  heart :  for  when  the 
Prophet  died  it  was  still  in  a  state  of  flux.  This 
fact  is  most  easily  explained  if  we  suppose  the  Koran 
to  have  been  ultimately  thought  of  as  a  series  of 
messages  which  do  not  together  constitute  a  book. 
Both  in  Hebrew  and  Arabic  the  same  word  signifies 
"  book "  and  "  letter,"  and  considerable  confusion 
results.  The  "  carriers  of  the  Koran "  were  the 
people  who  knew  certain  portions  of  it  by  heart ; 
according  to  an  early  historian  they  ran  some  risk  of 
being  exterminated  in  the  campaign  of  Yemamah 
which  followed  shortly  after  the  Prophet's  death. 
And  there  were  many  different  texts.  Few  followers 
of  the  Prophet  would  have  been  present  on  all  the 
occasions  when  revelations  were  delivered  ;  accident 
would  decide  whether  such  as  had  been  revealed 
during  their  absence  would  ever  be  communicated 
to  them.  At  a  later  period,  when  traditions  were 
committed  to  memory,  they  were  ordinarily  very 
brief,  usually  of  a  single  sentence.  The  normal 
memory  is  not  fit  to  hold  more.  It  is  conceivable 
that,  as  a  tradition  informs  us,  there  were  Believers 
famous  for  collecting  much  of  the  Koran,  i.e.  many 
verses ;  but  before  the  Prophet's  death  no  one 
probably  even  thought  he  possessed  all.     Nor,  indeed, 


THE   KORAN    AS   THE    BASIS    OF   ISLAM  7 

would  the  sense  of  the  word  "  all  "  in  such  a  case  be 
clear  ;  for  at  an  early  period  of  the  revelations  the 
doctrine  was  enunciated  that  texts  could  be  erased 
and  others  substituted  ;  and  if  a  text  be  erased,  it 
clearly  ceases  to  have  any  further  existence  ;  it  might 
figure  in  a  history  of  Islam  or  a  biography  of  the 
Prophet,  but  could  no  longer  figure  in  the  sacred 
volume  itself.  Yet  when  the  Koran  was  compiled, 
those  responsible  for  the  undertaking  were  conscious 
that  parts  of  the  work  did  abrogate  other  parts, 
though  they  did  not  think  it  their  duty  to  decide  the 
category  to  which  any  particular  text  belonged  ;  in 
a  sense,  then,  their  collection  was  larger  than  it  should 
have  been,  because  it  contained  matter  for  which 
something  better  had  been  substituted,  as  well  as  the 
substitute.  So  long  as  the  Prophet  lived  there 
could  be  no  complete  Koran  ;  his  death  completed 
it.  It  had  then  to  be  collected  before  its  nature 
could  be  determined. 

If  we  endeavour  to  analyse  the  conception  of  the 
Koran  as  revealed  to  us  in  the  work  itself,  we  shall 
find  most  help  in  a  passage  of  Surah  xxix.  46-49  : 
"  And  thus  have  we  sent  down  unto  thee  the  writing, 
and  those  to  whom  we  have  given  the  writing 
believe  therein,  and  among  these  there  are  such  as 
believe  therein,  and  none  deny  our  signs  save  the 
Unbelievers.  Neither  usedst  thou  before  it  to  read 
any  writing  nor  to  trace  it  with  thy  right  hand  ;  in 
that  case  the  mendacious  would  have  suspected. 
Nay,  it  is  distinct  signs  in  the  breasts  of  those  who 
have   been   given   knowledge,    and    none   deny   our 


8     EARLY    DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDANISM 

signs  save  the  iniquitous.  And  they  say  :  why  have 
not  signs  \^i.e.  miracles]  been  sent  down  unto  him 
from  his  Lord  ?  Say  :  the  signs  are  with  God  only, 
and  I  am  but  a  distinct  warner.  Does  it  not  then 
suffice  them  that  we  have  sent  down  unto  thee  the 
writing  to  be  read  unto  them  ?  "  The  author  is  here 
arguing  against  those  who  demand  a  sign  in  the 
sense  of  mii^acle  ;  he  declares  that  the  miracle  of  the 
Koran  is  sufficient.  The  practice  with  regard  to 
books  was  that  one  who  wished  for  a  copy  went  to 
the  author  and  obtained  leave  to  copy  the  original, 
or  else  to  hear  the  author  dictating  it.  So  in  the 
case  of  a  great  commentary  on  the  Koran  to  be 
mentioned  later,  the  possessor  of  a  copy  said  he  had 
attended  the  author's  dictation  of  it  for  eight  years. ^ 
This  theory  was  current  not  only  in  Arabia.  Plato 
makes  Zeno  bring  his  work  to  Athens  and  read  it 
aloud.  With  the  Arabs  the  custom  also  prevailed 
of  getting  the  author  to  testify  to  the  correctness  of 
the  copy.  And  the  writer  of  a  popular  book  had 
to  suffisr  for  his  success  ;  Hariri,  the  author  of  the 
work  which  perhaps  comes  second  to  the  Koran  in 
popularity,  informs  us  that  he  would  have  introduced 
a  correction  had  it  not  been  that  he  had  certified 
seven  hundred  copies — in  the  possession  of  readers 
who  came  to  him  for  authorisation — and  all  these 
contained  the  reading  which  he  would  gladly  have 
changed.  In  Mohammed's  case  the  trouble  of 
reading  or  taking  down  was  spared  ;  in  Surah  xxvi. 
193  the  revelation  is  brought  down  to  his  heart  by 

1  Yakut  vi.  424. 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM  9 

the  faithful  Spirit,  while  at  the  same  time  it  is  in  the 
tablets  of  the  ancients.  In  Surah  xxviii.  86  he  is 
told  that  he  had  never  hoped  that  the  writing  would 
be  flung  to  him.  The  Unbehevers  suggest  (vi.  7) 
that  it  should  have  been  flung  down  on  parchment 
so  that  they  could  touch  it  with  their  hands ;  they 
are  told  that  they  would  have  regarded  such  pro- 
cedure as  imposture  or  legerdemain.  On  the  other 
hand,  if  they  had  been  allowed  to  see  an  angel  bringing 
it  down, that  angel  would  have  either  annihilated  them, 
or  else  he  would  have  had  to  appear  in  human  shape, 
whence  the  suspicion  of  imposture  could  not  have 
been  avoided.  Still  this  "  writing  "  is  at  once  in  the 
tablets  of  the  ancients,  i.e.  in  the  hands  of  Jews  and 
Christians,  and  is  also  miraculously  communicated 
to  the  Prophet.  When  this  miraculously  communi- 
cated text  is  found  to  agree  with  the  matter  contained 
in  the  tablets  or  charts  of  the  monotheists,  and  for 
this  the  evidence  of  an  Israelite  is  adduced,  obviously 
a  miracle  has  taken  place,  and  Mohammed  is  divinely 
authorised  to  communicate  the  Book  of  God. 

He  communicates  it  in  his  own  language,  but 
whether  the  original  is  in  Arabic  is  not  clear  ;  there 
is  at  least  a  suggestion  that  it  is  in  a  divine  language  : 
"  We  have  made  it  an  Arabic  Koran  that  ye  might 
understand  it,  but  in  the  original  with  us  it  is  sublime, 
wise  "  (xliii.  2).  "  Subhme,  wise  "  probably  means 
in  an  exalted  and  learned  language.  "  Easing  it 
with  thy  tongue  "  (xliv.  58)  probably  means  trans- 
lating it  into  Arabic.  Its  name  Koran,  "  reading," 
refers  to  the  Prophet's  own  mental  experience.     The 


10  .  EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

earliest  revelation,  if  we  may  believe  the  tradition,  is 
one  wherein  he  is  told  to  read,  and  indeed  what  God 
had  taught  with  the  pen  ;  and  in  another  passage, 
with  reference  to  this  text,  God  is  said  to  have 
enjoined  upon  him  the  reading  (xxviii.  85).  To 
many  of  the  Surahs  letters  of  the  alphabet  are  pre- 
fixed, ordinarily  followed  by  some  such  sentence  as, 
T.S.M.  "  Those  are  the  letters  of  the  perspicuous 
writing";  A.L.M.  "That  is  the  writing,  there  is  no 
mistaking  it";  T.S.  "Those  are  the  letters  of  the 
reading  and  a  perspicuous  writing  "  ;  A.L.M.  "  Those 
are  the  letters  of  the  wise  writing";  H.M.A.S.Q. 
"  Thus  doth  God  reveal  unto  thee  as  unto  thy 
predecessors"  —  phrases  which  indicate  that  these 
letters  are  specimens  of  the  original  writing  which 
Mohammed  translates  into  Arabic  in  order  to  com- 
municate it  to  his  fellows.  The  original  is  in  God's 
possession,  and  like  other  authors  He  can  alter 
His  work  at  pleasure.  In  the  year  67  a.h.,  one 
'Abdallah  Ibn  Nauf,  who  delivered  oracles  in  the 
style  of  the  Koran,  prophesied  a  victory  for  his  party, 
naming  a  certain  Wednesday  ;  they  were  defeated. 
When  taunted  with  his  error,  he  quoted  the  maxim 
of  the  Koran,  "  God  possesses  the  original  of  the 
Book,  and  can  erase  or  enter  what  He  likes "  (xiii. 
39).^  The  prophecy  failed  to  come  true  because  the 
original  of  the  divine  book  had  been  altered.  This 
right  of  alteration  which  the  author  possesses  at  once 
explains  divergence  in  the  Koran  from  the  contents 
of  earlier  revelations,    and  divergence   between   the 

i  Tabari  ii.  732. 


THE   KORAN    AS   THE    BASIS    OF   ISLAM        11 

matter  communicated    to   the    Prophet    at  different 
times. 

That  the  contents  were  not  communicated  all  at 
once,  as  is  perhaps  the  case  with  ordinary  books, 
which  may  be  supposed  to  be  recited  continuously, 
or  at  least  at  successive  periods,  was  noticed  by 
Mohammed's  contemporaries  as  a  fact  requiring 
explanation ;  and  the  accounts  given  are  the  con- 
venience of  the  hearers  (xvii.  107),  and  the  confirming 
of  the  Prophet's  mind  (xxv.  34).  Possibly  the 
meaning  of  this  latter  phrase  is  "to  render  the 
Prophet's  grasp  of  it  more  certain."  Whether  these 
explanations  were  adequate  or  not,  it  was  most 
important  that  it  should  not  be  communicated  all 
at  once ;  for  the  value  of  the  Koran  clearly  lay  in 
what  it  added  to  former  versions  of  the  Scriptures, 
not  in  what  it  shared  with  them.  The  reasoning 
which  underlies  the  Surahs  that  have  been  quoted 
is  curiously  like  that  which  we  employ  in  the 
case  of  MSS.  unearthed.  We  possess  fragments  of 
various  works  known  in  antiquity ;  say  an  ostensible 
copy  of  one  of  these  works  were  produced,  we  should 
at  once  look  out  for  the  fragments  already  known ; 
and  one  of  the  tests  of  its  genuineness  would  be  its 
containing  those  fragments  ;  only  its  value  would  not 
lie  in  those  fragments,  but  in  w^hat  it  added  to  them. 
Hence  the  aorreement  of  the  Koran  with  earlier 
revelations  had  in  the  main  evidential  value,  proving 
that  the  Prophet  had  really  been  chosen  to  com- 
municate the  divine  book  to  his  fellows  ;  its  intrinsic 
value  lay  in  what  it   added   to   earlier   revelations. 


12    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

At  times  it  claimed  to  settle  points  which  those  revela- 
tions had  left  obscure  ;  at  times  to  alter  what  they  con- 
tained, on  the  principle  which  we  have  already  seen. 

A^ow,  as  we  have  seen,  the  word  used  for  "  book  " 
in  Arabic  also  means  "  letter,"  and  considerable 
confusion  results.  A  book  is  doubtless  in  all  cases 
a  message,  but  a  message  is  not  necessarily  a  book. 
The  message  need  be  of  no  permanent  import- 
ance, having  reference  to  a  momentary  emergency. 
Similarly,  a  messenger — which  is  the  name  whereby 
Mohammed  ordinarily  describes  himself — is  thought 
of  as  bringing  an  order  or  piece  of  information 
required  for  an  immediate  need  rather  than  as 
communicating  what  is  to  be  permanent.  The 
ambassador  communicates  the  wishes  of  his  govern- 
ment as  they  arise  ;  those  wishes  are  usually  no  more 
permanent  than  the  occasions  with  which  they  are 
concerned.  And  although  the  Koran  is  thought  of 
at  times  as  read  by  the  Prophet  from  the  original 
which  he  could  mentally  see,  in  many  cases  perhaps 
the  rendering  "  despatch  "  would  be  truer  than  the 
rendering  "  book."  It  has  been  noticed  that  the 
word  which  we  ordinarily  render  "  reveal,"  and  which 
literally  means  "  send  down,"  is  properly  applied  to 
royal  rescripts ;  the  suppliant  "  raises  "  a  petition 
and  the  sovereign  "  sends  down "  the  reply.  The 
faithful  at  Medinah  used  to  await  fresh  revelations 
each  day  somewhat  as  we  in  these  days  are  on  the 
look  out  for  the  morning  paper.  The  formula  which 
we  not  unfrequently  find  employed,  "  They  will  ask 
thee  :  say,"  or  "  They  will  say,  but  say  thou,"  is  such 


.    I 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE    BASIS   OF   ISLAM        13 

as  belongs  to  temporary  embarrassment  or  temporary 
controversy.  The  objection  or  difficulty  which  has 
been  raised  is  settled,  and  it  is  presumed  that  it  will 

not  recur. 

At  neither  the  Meccan  nor  the  Medinese  period  of 
the  Koranic  revelation  was  its  nature  such  as  to  give 
it   permanence.       In    the    former   period   there   was 
constant   repetition   of  the   same    matter;    and   the 
Prophet,  reading  off  the  celestial  original,  naturally 
repeatedly  read  the  same  material.     There  is,  then, 
some  variation  in  the  detail,  but  little  in  the  general 
trend  of  the  discourses.      The  disagreement  is  not 
more    considerable    than    that    between    the    three 
accounts,  say,  of  the  conversion  of  St  Paul  in  the 
Acts  of  the  Apostles.     It  is  clearly  not  the  intention 
of  the  author  of  that  work  to  give  accounts  of  the 
same  event  which  supplement  one  another ;  still  less 
accounts  which  contradict  each  other;  his  desire  is 
not   to   repeat    himself    literally.      And    the    same 
rhetorical  or  artistic  principle  underhes  the  Koranic 
treatment  of  the  legends  of  the  Prophets.     The  tales 
are  told  vividly ;  and  this  vividness  excludes  literal 
repetition.     They  are,  so  to  speak,  repeated  presenta- 
tions of  the  same  theme,  not  copies  printed  off  the 
sam.e  types.     Some  of  these  sermons  would  be  more 
impressive  than  others,   and   occasionally  a  passage 
would  occur  which  would  attract  special  attention  ; 
but  the  general  sameness  of  the  matter  would  prevent 
any  discourse  being  thought  to  have  permanent  value, 
unless,  indeed,  some  passages  were  selected  for  use  in 
common  worship. 


14    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

When  the  Prophet  went  to  Medinah,  the  Koran 
assumed  another  form,  but  even  this  was  no  more 
hkely  to  secure  permanence.  It  dealt  very  largely 
with  current  events,  drawing  morals  from  the 
immediate  past  instead  of  employing  for  this  purpose 
the  mythical  or  historical  past.  It  explained  why 
the  Moslems  had  been  defeated  at  Uhud,  why  the 
Prophet  had  taken  the  wife  of  his  adopted  son,  why 
he  had  evaded  a  promise  made  to  his  wives ;  it 
defended  the  honour  of  *A'ishah,  it  extolled  various 
victories,  it  threatened  the  hostile  and  the  disaffected. 
It  regulated  various  forms  of  procedure,  the  division 
of  inheritances,  the  attestation  of  wills,  disputes 
between  married  couples,  the  etiquette  of  the 
Prophet's  court.  The  interest  attaching  to  few  of 
these  subjects  would  seem  to  be  permanent ;  when 
the  defeat  at  Uhud  had  been  wiped  out  by  a  signal 
victory,  only  antiquarian  interest  would  attach  to 
it,  and  few  would  wish  to  remember  the  scandal 
about  'A'ishah.  On  the  other  hand,  there  was  no 
reason  why  the  Prophet  should  be  bound  by  his 
own  precedents,  since  he  expressly  reserved  to  Allah 
the  right  to  revise  the  Koran.  Even  its  legislation, 
owing  to  the  possibility  of  its  being  revised,  was 
scarcely  felt  to  have  permanent  value ;  when  the 
Prophet  was  asked  to  decide  a  case,  he  had  to  wait 
until  a  revelation  dealing  with  it  was  vouchsafed 
him,  and  he  was  not  even  entitled  to  specify  the 
time  wherein  he  could  count  on  such  a  communica- 
tion being  delivered.^    Since  it  is  rare  that  two  actual 

1  Shafi%  Umm  vii.  271. 


\ 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        15 

cases  correspond  in  every  detail,  it  would  be  better 
on  some  later  occasion  that  the  Prophet  should  be 
similarly  favoured  than  that  he  should  have  to 
depend  on  the  accuracy  of  his  memory  or  of  a 
document.  While,  then,  the  Prophet  lived,  the 
Koran  could  not  acquire  the  importance  which  it 
afterwards  received,  and  it  is  probable  that  little 
concern  was  bestowed  on  any  parts  save  those 
regularly  used  in  liturgy. 

To  accept  Islam  meant  simply  to  promise  obedience 
to  the  Prophet,  according  to  some  authorities  in 
matters  lawful  and  honourable,  but  such  a  stipula- 
tion has  little  meaning  when  the  Prophet  was 
recognised  as  the  dictator  in  such  matters.  And 
where  the  undertaking  given  is  of  this  sort,  the 
word  "  system "  is  inapplicable ;  since  the  dictator 
cannot  say  what  he  may  dictate,  there  is  no  reason 
why  he  should  tie  his  hands.  The  obligations  were 
not  specified  because  they  had  not  been  defined. 

Whether  the  Prophet  gave  much  consideration  to 
the  effects  of  his  own  death  is  uncertain ;  this  is,  we 
are  told,  a  matter  whereon  mankind  are  most  incon- 
sistent. The  possibilities  of  the  present  dispensation 
coming  to  an  end  and  of  his  own  death,  which  indeed 
he  seems  sometimes  to  think  of  as  an  alternative, 
were  clearly  considered  during  the  difficulties  and 
stress  of  the  Meccan  period ;  when  he  became  despot 
of  a  community  he  appears  to  have  been  too  much 
occupied  with  other  things  to  pay  much  attention  to 
such  matters.  There  is  a  tradition  that  he  prophesied 
the  complete  extinction  of  the  race  within  a  hundred 


16    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

years  of  his  time,  but  its  authenticity  is  denied.^  A 
theory  that,  hke  the  Christian  Messiah,  he  was  to 
return  was  preached  not  long  after  his  death,  and 
based  on  a  verse  of  the  Koran,  but  the  preacher 
seems  to  have  found  few  adherents  ;  ^  for  some  reason 
or  other  the  sects  which  looked  forward  to  the 
appearance  of  a  hidden  Messiah  ordinarily  fixed  on 
someone  else.  The  common-sense  which  Mohammed 
almost  invariably  displayed  makes  us  unwilling  to 
suppose  that  he  regarded  himself  as  immune  from 
the  common  calamity,  though  we  are  told  that  his 
followers  at  first  declined  to  believe  in  his  death 
when  it  occurred,  and  that  some  Arab  tribes  made 
this  occurrence  an  excuse  for  rejecting  Islam.  There 
is  a  story  that  on  his  deathbed  he  desired  to  dictate 
a  code,  but  that  those  who  heard  him  supposed  him 
to  be  in  delirium,  and  declined  to  take  advantage  of 
this  offer.  If  this  be  true,  it  indicates  how  deeply 
»they  were  impressed  with  the  belief  that  the  Koran 
was  a  divine  composition  wherein  the  Prophet  him- 
self had  no  hand  ;  for  any  ostensible  revelation  would 
have  been  welcomed  and  implicitly  obeyed. 

Still,  like  other  prophets  and  legislators,  Mohammed 
died,  and  he  had  made  no  provision  for  a  successor, 
or  at  least  any  such  provision  was  suppressed. 
Prophets  arose  in  Arabia,  but  they  were  not  of  this 
fold,  and  their  claims  were  rejected  unheard  by  those 
who  had  accepted  the  claims  of  Mohammed.  Of 
modern   critics    very   few,   and    of  ancient  ]Moslems 

1  Mukhtalifal-Hadith,  p.  119. 

2  Tabari  i.  -2942.     Surah  xxviii.  85. 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        17 

scarcely  any,  put  into  practice  the  doctrine  of  the 
Koran  that  one  prophet  is  as  good  as  another :  that 
'*we   make   no   distinction   between   any  of  them." 
Yet  it  might  seem  that  if  the  claim  of  any  one  man 
to  legislate  and  govern  by  inspiration   be  admitted, 
we  are  not  entitled  to  reject  unheard  that  of  another. 
If  there  be  any  uniformity  in  the  conduct  of  the 
world,  it  is  difficult  to  think  of  any  one  age  being  so 
favoured  as  to  have  the  Hving  presence  of  a  divine 
ambassador,   while    previous    and    subsequent    ages 
must   content   themselves    with    a   prospect   and    a 
retrospect.     Nevertheless,  this   is   what  the  Moslem 
system  assumes  ;  the  place  of  the  Prophet  is  occupied 
by   a  prince,  a  deputy,   authorised   to    conduct  the 
afFairs  of  the  community,  but  by  no  means  either  in 
direct  communication  with  the  Deity  or  empowered 
to  tamper  with  the  ruHngs  of  the  Prophet.     Among 
those  who  enjoyed  power  during  the  first  century  of 
Islam  perhaps  the  adventurer  Mukhtar,  who  was  for 
a  short  time  supreme  in  Kufah,  was  the  only  pre- 
tender  to   mysterious   powers.     He   claimed    to   be 
infaUible,^  and   conveyed   his   commands   in   a  style 
closely  modelled  on  that  of  the  Koran.     His  prayers 
were   regarded   by   his    lieutenants    as   the   best   of 
reinforcements.'^     When    called    "  Liar,"  he   pointed 
out    that    other    "Prophets"    had    been    similarly 
designated.     He  established  a  cult  of  a  Sacred  Chair 
which  was  something  between  a  Urim  and  Thummim 
and  an   Ark   of  the    Covenant.'       Nevertheless,  he 

1  Tabari  ii.  626.  2  jUd.,  644,  13. 

3  Ibid.,  706. 

2 


18    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

claimed  to  be  acting  not  on  his  own  account,  but  on 
that  of  the  Mahdi,  i.e.  the  divinely  guided  member 
of  the  Prophet's  household,  who  seems  to  have  been 
somewhat  shy  of  acknowledging  this  agent.  And, 
indeed,  a  theory  arose  that  the  Prophet's  family  wxre 
the  true  interpreters  of  the  Koran,  possessed  of 
mysterious  knowledge,  which  prevented  them  from 
making  mistakes.  In  the  latest  period  of  the 
Umayyad  dynasty,  while  the  two  branches  of  the 
Prophet's  house  were  still  united  in  a  common  aim, 
a  preacher  not  only  states  this  doctrine,  but  declares 
that  all  the  adherents  of  the  Prophet's  house  were 
agreed  about  it.  An  agent  who  came  with  proper 
credentials  from  the  head  of  the  family  must  be  a 
competent  agent ;  the  danger  that  Satan  might  have 
misled  the  head  of  the  family  in  his  interpretation  of 
the  Koran  need  not  even  be  considered.^  A  few 
years  before  this  we  are  told  that  the  adherents  of 
the  Prophet's  family  attributed  to  them  knowledge 
of  futurity,  and  even  made  them  objects  of  worship.^ 
And  this  doctrine  was  never  abandoned  by  the 
Prophet's  descendants  and  their  adherents,  but  it 
was  not  adopted  for  any  practical  purpose  by  the 
heirs  of  his  uncle,  who  for  the  most  important  period 
of  Islam  were  supreme. 

Had  the  claims  been  accepted  of  one  of  those 
prophets  who  arose  after  Mohammed's  death,  a  state 
of  aifairs  analogous  to  what  existed  w^hen  he  was 
at  Medinah  would  for  a  time  have  continued  ;  the 
nearest  possible  approach  to  a  theocracy,  since   the 

1  Tabarlii.  1961.  ^  j^id,^  i682. 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        19 

community  would  always  have  been  subject  to  an 
accredited  representative  of  its  god:  bound  by  no 
code  and  attached  to  no  precedents.  The  rejection 
of  these  claims  closed  the  avenue  to  the  divine 
communications,  whereon  the  community  could  no 
longer  rely  for  guidance.  To  have  accepted  the 
claim  of  one  or  other  of  these  prophets  would  have 
necessitated  another  break  with  the  past,  for  this 
whole  theory  of  prophets  impHes  that  the  operation 
of  the  Divine  Being  in  the  world  is  spasmodic,  not 
continuous ;  there  would  have  been  no  guarantee 
that  the  system  elaborated  by  Mohammed  during  a 
decade  of  years  might  not  be  violently  upset.  More- 
over, though  the  Creed  recognised  him  only,  the 
Refugees  and  Helpers  had  played  a  conspicuous  part 
in  his  career ;  if  they  would  not  have  come  into 
existence  without  him,  he  would  have  failed  egregi- 
ously  without  them.  For  a  time,  then,  in  spite  of 
his  removal,  the  organisation  which  he  had  created 
could  continue. 

According  to  all  appearances  the  death  of  the 
Prophet  made  at  first  little  difference  in  the  conduct 
of  affairs,  because  his  successors  were  his  most 
trusted  advisers,  the  persons  most  familiar  with  his 
ideas  and  plans.  And  the  extraordinary  series  of 
successes  which  occupied  these  years  rendered  the 
cessation  of  prophecy  easily  tolerable  ;  for  the  most 
frequent  purpose  of  prophecy  in  the  years  at  Medinah 
had  been  apology  and  polemic,  for  neither  of  which 
was  there  now  any  occasion.  That  the  Prophet's 
household    should    have    been    unable    to    form    a 


20    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

dangerous  party  within  the  state  is  certainly  remark- 
able ;  that  they  were  not  able  to  do  this  must  be 
explained  partly  by  the  political  incompetence  of 
Ali,  which  afterwards  became  notorious,  partly  by 
the  fact  that  his  relations  with  the  Prophet's  daughter, 
his  wife,  were  wanting  in  cordiality.  Hence  the 
Companions  were  able  to  thrust  the  Prophet's  family 
aside,  and  even  deprive  them  of  their  inheritance, 
without  endangering  the  permanence  of  the  state 
which  he  had  founded.  And  it  is  possible  that  the 
maxim  whereby  this  procedure  was  justified  was  put 
into  the  Prophet's  mouth,  made  one  of  his  Acta, 
by  them. 

These  Acta,  however,  no  one  thought  of  collecting 
and  preserving,  and  though  the  Prophet's  letters  had 
the  force  of  law  in  his  lifetime,  there  was  no  one  who 
performed  the  service  which  has  been  so  useful  to 
posterity  in  the  case  of  the  correspondence  of  Cicero 
or  of  St  Paul.  Probably  there  must  be  some  literary 
tradition  current  in  a  community  before  the  desir- 
ability of  such  procedure  occurs  ;  and  such  literary 
tradition  was  wanting  in  both  Meccah  and  Medinah, 
nor  could  that  of  the  more  civilised  nations  speedily 
to  be  subdued  be  assimilated  before  some  decades 
had  elapsed.  The  scribes  who  had  composed  the 
Prophet's  letters  and  the  persons  to  whom  they  had 
been  delivered  were  not  conscious  of  their  historic 
importance.  And,  as  has  already  been  seen,  their 
appreciation  of  the  despatches  from  Almighty  God 
was  not  much  more  intense.  Doubtless,  some  verses 
of  these   despatches   had  to  be  recited  in  the  daily 


THE   KORAN   AS  THE   BASIS   OF  ISLAM        21 

worship,  but  according  to  some  authorities  it  was  of 
no  consequence  which  the  verses  were  ;  provided  they 
formed  part  of  the  Koran,  any  which  the  worshipper 
remembei^d  might  be  repeated  by  him  in  his  orisons.^ 
The  importance  of  the  sacred  book  grew  at  first 
slowly,  though  with  accelerating  pace ;  but  the 
consequences  of  the  original  neglect  can  be  found 
in  the  earliest  and  best  of  the  commentaries.  Where 
we  expect  certainty,  we  find  guesswork  and  fiction. 
Even  the  two  recensions  of  the  Koran  are  confused 
by  the  great  Tabari.^  There  are  allusions  to  which 
the  key  is  lost,  though  we  should  have  expected  that 
anyone  who  was  in  Medinah  when  the  verses  were 
first  recited  would  have  been  able  to  explain  them. 
If  the  commentaries  on  the  Koran  be  compared  with, 
say,  the  Greek  comments  on  Homer,  which  do  not 
claim  to  be  more  than  the  guesses  of  a  later  age 
on  the  sense  of  an  ancient  text,  the  difference  is 
scarcely  noticeable.  The  certainty  which  belongs 
to  an  authoritative  tradition  is  wanting  in  both 
cases. 

Both  indulge  constantly  in  what  might  be  called 
cheap  fictions — stories  intended  to  account  for  the 
verses  such  as  anyone  could  invent,  and  which, 
therefore,  have  nothing  convincing  about  them. 
Even  where  explanations  which  we  know  from  some 
other  source  to  be  true  are  given,  side  by  side  with 
them  false  comments  are  recorded  as  of  equal 
authority.  Nor  do  correct  explanations  give  the 
appearance  of  being   handed  down  by  persons  who 

1  Shafi%  Umm  i.  88.  2  Comm.  iii.  24. 


22    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

experienced  the  original  delivery  of  the  messages, 
but  rather  of  being  the  result  of  conscious  and 
erudite  combination.  And  this  indicates  that  the 
value  assigned  to  the  revelations  by  their  con- 
temporaries was  quite  different  from  that  which  is 
assigned  to  a  permanent  code.  The  revelations  were 
thought  of  as  solutions  of  questions  that  cropped 
up,  modes  of  dealing  with  difficulties,  or  as  having 
reference  to  particular  emergencies,  particular  states 
of  mind  experienced  by  the  Prophet  or  his  followers, 
or  even  his  enemies.  However  great  the  anxiety 
which  these  may  have  occasioned  at  the  time,  those 
eventful  years  speedily  brought  other  experiences 
which  obscured  the  former ;  the  crises  were  too 
numerous  for  excessive  importance  to  be  attached 
to  any.  And,  in  any  case,  the  crisis  was  more  likely 
to  be  remembered  than  the  revelation  associated 
with  it.  So  long  as  the  Prophet  was  among  them 
the  living  voice  was  vastly  more  important  than 
the  letters  which  had  been  recited  and  largely 
served  their  purpose.  The  persons  who  knew  may 
never  have  been  asked  about  the  import  of  particular 
words  and  phrases,  and  had  no  occasion  to  com- 
municate their  knowledge ;  no  systematic  teaching 
had  begun  before  the  best  authorities  had  passed 
away.  And  we  have,  besides,  to  take  account  of  the 
fact  that  at  times  it  may  not  have  been  thought 
desirable  to  communicate  the  truth. 

No  contradiction  should  ever  surprise  us  in  human 
conduct,  and  there  are  numerous  analogies  which 
help   us   to   understand   the    attitude   of    the   early 


THE    KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        23 

Moslems  towards  the  words  of  their  Prophet  and 
then-  God.  "  This  man  spake  as  never  man  spake  " 
— that  is  recorded  of  the  Founder  of  Christianity  ; 
yet,  in  spite  of  Christian  dogma,  we  are  still  relegated 
to  the  region  of  conjecture  as  to  the  language  in 
which  these  discourses  were  delivered,  and  the 
persons  who  are  responsible  for  the  translations  in 
Avhich  we  possess  them.  In  the  case  of  the  Koran 
we  are  at  least  in  possession  of  certainty  with  regard 
to  these  two  points  :  the  language  and  the  collectors. 
And  though,  as  shall  be  seen,  great  importance  was 
not  attached  by  the  earliest  Moslems  to  the  wording 
of  the  Koran,  still  it  was  known  to  embody  an  arti- 
fice which  secured  a  certain  amount,  though  only  a 
limited  amount,  of  permanence,  and  which  distin- 
guished the  matter  composing  it  from  any  that  was 
not  intentionally  fabricated  so  as  to  resemble  it. 
Texts  which  had  formed  part  of  the  divine  revelation 
were  known  to  be  cast  in  a  certain  mould ;  and 
although  that  mould  was  somewhat  elastic,  the 
restriction  on  possible  revelations  which  resulted  was 
considerable.  Verse  compositions  were  excluded,  for 
the  Prophet  had  not  been  taught  versification ;  prose 
compositions  were  excluded  because  the  genuine 
verses  had  an  artifice,  though  one,  it  is  true,  of 
extreme  simplicity.  Further,  we  find  in  the  Koran 
itself  the  dogma  that  the  style  of  the  book  is  inimit- 
able, and  those  who  believed  the  Prophet  accepted 
the  dogma,  and  in  a  way  perhaps  expected  that  the 
Koran  could  take  care  of  itself.  In  general,  however, 
we   attribute   the   carelessness   with   regard   to    this 


24    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

possession  to  want  of  familiarity  with  literary  methods 
and  habits. 

But  a  vision  gains  in  importance  by  being  sealed, 
and  more  than   once   in   the   Jewish   and   Christian 
Scriptures  do  we  come  across  a  command  to  seal  the 
book,   meaning   not   to   secrete  its  contents,  but  to 
terminate  it  definitely  so  as  to  exclude  the  possibility 
of  further  additions.     The  liability  to  abrogation,  the 
ephemeral  and   occasional   nature  of  the  revelations 
which   prevented  their  hearers   from  overestimating 
their   value,    disappeared   when   once   the   spring  of 
revelation  had  run  dry.     The  book  may  have  been 
closed  more  than   once  in  the   Prophet's  time,  just 
as  he  may  have  received   more  than  one  command 
to    contract   no   more  marriages  ;  but  so  long  as  a 
man  lives  he  can  change  his  mind ;  God  could  alter 
the  text.     After  the   removal   of  the   Prophet   the 
messages  which  he  had  delivered  could  take  his  place 
to  some  extent,  as  being  an  authority  which  no  one 
dare   question.     The  consternation  of  the  Moslems 
at   the  death  of  the  Prophet  was,  according  to  the 
tradition,  allayed  by   a   quotation  from   the    Koran 
wherein   the    Prophet's    death    was    foretold ;    that 
quotation  appears  then  to  have  been  heard  for  the 
first   time.     The   lessons   impressed  on  the  mind  of 
the   person  who   produced  this  text  may  well  have 
been  two :  the  value  of  the  Koran  to  those  who  pos- 
sessed it,  and  the  danger  of  leaving  this  possession  un- 
guarded.    Short  as  was  the  reign  of  the  first  successor, 
barely  two  years,  and  those  occupied  by  campaigns, 
the  need  for  a  collection  of  the  Koran  became  acutely 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM         25 

felt,  and  an  order  was  issued  for  its  execution.  The 
prophecy  had  to  be  sealed.  And  the  first  successor, 
having  followed  the  Prophet  from  the  commence- 
ment of  his  career,  and  been  his  inseparable 
companion,  would  be  likely  to  know  better  than  any- 
one else  what  had  or  had  not  been  revealed. 

Although  the  traditions  which  are  quoted  in  con- 
nection with  this  scheme  must  be  received  with 
caution,  they  seem  rightly  to  represent  the  difficulty 
as  appalling.  Our  best  authority  does  not  appear 
to  countenance  the  supposition  that  any  part  of  the 
Koran  was  in  writing ;  for  had  it  existed  in  that 
state,  the  danger  that  it  would  perish  with  the  death 
of  the  Islamic  champions  would  not  have  been  serious. 
In  the  first  account  of  Tabarl  it  is  the  collector  who 
first  writes  it  on  the  naive  materials  at  his  disposal ; 
the  second  successor  of  the  Prophet  has  it  transferred 
from  these  to  a  scroll,  which  remained  in  the 
possession  of  his  daughter,  but  was  afterwards 
"  washed  out "  by  order  of  the  third  successor.  In 
the  Koran  itself  there  is  a  reference  to  Scripture- 
Readers,  persons  besides  the  Prophet  who  read  aloud 
the  texts  (xxii.  71) ;  it  is  likely  that  these  men  would 
have  committed  them  to  memory  from  MS.,  although 
they  found  permanent  lodging  in  their  breasts. 
Indeed,  the  difficulty  of  teaching  without  the  use 
of  writing  is  so  great  that  we  can  scarcely  believe 
any  lengthy  document  would  be  committed  to 
memory  any  other  way.  When,  however,  the  texts 
had  been  thoroughly  learned,  the  leaflet  which  had 
been  employed  in  the  process  of  learning  would  have 


26    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

no  further  value  and  might  be  allowed  to  perish. 
And  so  the  mockers  are  thought  of  as  "  hearing  and 
knowing,"  not  as  possessing  and  reading  (xlv.  7,  8). 

The  collector  is  represented  as  consulting  all  the 
jNIeccan  and  Medinese  followers  of  the  Prophet,  and 
putting  down  what  they  had  "got,"  i.e.  such  texts 
as  they  had  learned  ;  his  main  difficulty  must  have 
lain  in  the  fact  already  noticed — that  the  Surahs 
were  largely  repetition  of  the  same  matter,  with  at 
times  slight,  at  other  times  considerable,  variations. 
A  preacher  or  lecturer  may  well  have  occasion  to 
repeat  the  same  statements  or  their  substance  a 
great  number  of  times  ;  but  such  repetition  has  no 
place  in  a  book,  wherein  the  same  text  can  be 
repeatedly  read,  least  of  all  in  a  communication  from 
Almighty  God.  The  theory  that  precepts  may  be 
occasional,  i.e.  vary  with  different  circumstances,  is 
admissible ;  but  the  opinion  of  the  Divine  Being  on 
ancient  history  cannot  possibly  vary.  Where  on  one 
occasion  the  Koran  quotes  a  number  of  different 
opinions  about  a  difficult  matter,  viz.  the  number  of 
the  Sleepers  in  the  Cave  and  whether  their  dog 
counted  or  not,  it  is  to  condemn  them  all  as  con- 
jectures, not  to  record  them  as  possible  solutions. 
Hence  the  collector  had  to  settle  the  difficult  question 
whether  he  should  treat  each  separate  account  of  the 
story  of  Moses  or  Abraham  as  a  distinct  Surah,  or 
whether  they  should  be  regarded  as  different  versions 
of  the  same.  There  is  a  tradition  that  the  Prophet, 
when  discrepancies  in  reading  were  called  to  his 
attention  and   he   had  declared  all  readings  correct, 


THE   KORAN   AS  THE   BASIS   OF  ISLAM         27 

explained  that  the  Koran  had  been  revealed  in  seven 
texts ;  which  may  mean  that  the  same  passage  in  the 
original  Koran  had  been  reproduced  by  him  in  seven 
different  ways.  Probably  the  Prophet,  had  the 
scheme  of  collecting  the  Koran  come  into  his  mind, 
would  have  selected  one  version  of  each  story  and 
abrogated  the  others ;  but  to  do  this  certainly 
exceeded  the  power  of  anyone  but  himself. 

It  is  usual  to  suppose  that  the  last  or  ultimate 
version  in  such  a  case  is  the  best  and  most  authorita- 
tive ;  and  though  ordinarily  the  different  versions  of 
the  same  narrative  make  no  reference  to  each  other, 
sometimes  the  mode  of  statement  gives  an  impression 
of  being  a  corrected  edition  or  an  increased  edition  of 
what  has  preceded.  So  in  the  lengthy  account  of 
Pharaoh  and  Moses  in  Surah  xxviii.  we  have  at  the 
commencement  the  explanation  that  Pharaoh  divided 
his  people  into  castes,  of  which  the  oppressed,  i.e.  the 
Israelites,  formed  one ;  in  Surah  xL,  besides  the 
ascription  to  Pharaoh  of  the  desire  to  build  the  tower 
(probably  of  Babel),  a  wholly  new  personage  is 
introduced,  viz.  a  member  of  the  Pharaonic  family 
who  believed  but  concealed  his  faith,  yet  never- 
theless delivered  a  homily  quite  indistinguishable 
from  those  customary  in  the  mouths  of  monotheistic 
prophets.  In  Surah  xi.  the  story  of  Noah  is  enriched 
with  an  account  of  a  son  of  Noah  who  disobeyed  his 
father  and  perished  in  the  Flood.  The  text  observes 
that  this  is  a  mystery  which  neither  the  Prophet  nor 
his  people  had  previously  known.  We  should  infer 
that  these   new  details  of  the  story  of  Noah    were 


28    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

what  had  been  unknown  before  this  particular  revela- 
tion, some  account  of  the  patriarch  having  previously- 
been  communicated. 

It  is  not  possible  for  us  to  locate  these  Surahs 
chronologically  on  the  supposition  that  the  accounts 
gradually  grow  more  to  correspond  with  the  Biblical 
tradition,  for  the  human  mind  is  both  receptive  and 
forgetful ;  the  introduction  of  Haman  and  Korah 
into  the  story  of  Moses  and  Pharaoh  may  be  due  to 
access  of  knowledge,  or  their  omission  may  be  due  to 
such  access ;  this  is  not  a  matter  whereon  we  can 
pronounce  a  prioii.  The  collector  may  possibly  have 
been  able  to  pursue  investigations  into  the  dates  of 
revelation,  but  where  the  dating  of  events  was  vague, 
it  would  be  difficult  to  obtain  any  accurate  informa- 
tion on  this  subject.  Probably,  then,  he  introduced 
into  his  collection  any  copies  that  he  could  find  of 
revelations  certified  to  have  been  actually  delivered. 
And  although  the  repetition  is  intolerable  in  the 
book,  it  is  probable  that  accurate  reporting  of  the 
Prophet's  discourses  during  his  career  of  twenty-three 
years  would  not  have  resulted  in  a  much  larger 
volume  than  the  collector  put  together. 

From  the  fluid  nature  of  the  revelation  it  comes 
that  though  the  Koran  constantly  eulogises  itself, 
it  rarely  quotes  itself;  the  cases  in  which  it  takes 
account  of  earlier  statements  are  exceptional.  A  quite 
exceptional  case  of  a  series  of  references  is  to  be 
found  in  connection  with  the  story  of  Abraham.  In 
Surah  xix.  48,  which  is  early  in  the  Meccan  period, 
Abraham  promises  to  ask  forgiveness  for  his  father. 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        29 

In  Surah  xxvi.  86  he  actually  does  this.  He  prays, 
"  Forgive  my  father :  he  is  one  of  those  that  go 
astray."  In  Surah  xiv.  42  he  says,  "Forgive  me  and 
my  parents  and  the  Believers  on  the  day  whereon 
the  reckoning  shall  be  made,"  rather  implying  that 
Abraham's  father  was  not  an  Unbeliever.  But  in 
Surah  ix.,  nearly  at  the  end  of  the  Prophet's  career, 
verse  114  declares  that  neither  the  Prophet  nor  the 
Believers  have  any  business  to  ask  forgiveness  for 
the  pagans,  even  though  they  were  their  relatives, 
when  it  has  become  clear  that  they  are  to  be  damned  ; 
they  are  thus  forbidden  to  do  what  Abraham  clearly 
did  in  Surah  xxvi.  Hence  Surah  ix.  proceeds  :  "  Now 
Abraham's  praying  that  his  father  should  be  forgiven 
was  only  due  to  a  promise  which  he  had  made  him  " ; 
i.e.  the  promise  recorded  in  Surah  xix.  is  the  explana- 
tion of  Abraham's  conduct  as  recorded  in  Surah  xxvi." 
And  in  Surah  Ix.  Abraham's  conduct  is  held  up  as 
exemplary,  when  he  and  his  companions  said  to  their 
people  "  We  are  quit  of  you  and  what  ye  worship 
other  than  God ;  eternal  enmity  and  hatred  show 
themselves  between  us  until  ye  believe  in  God  only : 
except  the  saying  of  Abraham  to  his  father,  '  I  will 
ask  forgiveness  for  thee.'"  That,  it  is  allowed,  is  not 
to  be  imitated :  it  can  only  be  excused.  Surah  ix. 
proceeds,  in  verse  115,  "  Now  when  it  became  clear  to 
Abraham  that  his  father  was  an  enemy  to  Allah,  he 
declared  himself  quit  of  him." 

What  is  clear  is  that  Surahs  ix.  and  Ix.  recognise 
the  existence  of  Surahs  xix.  and  xxvi.,  and  it  is  fairly 
clear  that  Surah  ix.  recognises  and  appeals  to  Surah  Ix. 


30    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

Equally  exceptional  are  the  cases  in  which  we  have 
the  contents  of  two  editions  side  by  side.  The 
clearest  is  perhaps  in  Surah  viii.,  where  verse  66 
asserts  that  one  Moslem  in  war  is  equal  to  ten 
Unbelievers,  and  this  is  followed  by  verse  67,  "  Now 
God  has  lightened  the  burden  upon  you,  knowing 
that  there  is  weakness  in  you/'  and  reduced  the 
proportion  by  eighty  per  cent.  ;  one  Believer  is  to  be 
equal  to  two  Unbelievers.  Here  we  are,  so  to  speak, 
taken  into  the  Prophet's  study  ;  the  Surah  is  re-edited 
with  a  necessary  modification. 

At  times  where  such  references  are  given,  they 
only  produce  fresh  enigmas.  So  in  a  matter  with 
which  we  shall  presently  deal,  we  find  Surah  xvi.  119 
quote  a  list  of  foods  forbidden  to  the  Jews  which  is 
to  be  found  in  Surah  vi.  147 ;  whereas  Surah  vi.  146 
equally  clearly  quotes  a  list  of  foods  forbidden  to 
Moslems  which  is  given  in  Surah  xvi.  116.  The 
explanation  of  such  a  case  can  only  be  found  in  the 
repetition  of  the  same  matter  differently  arranged, 
which  we  have  seen  to  be  characteristic  of  the  lecture 
as  opposed  to  the  book. 

The  stories  furnished  by  later  writers  of  the  mode 
wherein  the  Koran  was  edited  are  all  clearly  affected 
by  the  practice  of  the  traditionalists,  and  little  credit 
attaches  to  them.  All  that  we  can  gather  of  the 
editor's  method  is  that  he  intended  to  be  as  objective 
as  possible ;  i.e.  to  leave  the  employment  of  the 
sacred  volume  as  free  as  possible  to  the  Moslem 
community.  For  since  the  doctrine  that  parts  of  the 
work  abrogated  other  parts  was  openly  acknowledged. 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        31 

any  suspicion  of  chronological  arrangement  would 
settle  the  important  question,  which  texts  were 
abrogated.  And  possibly  this  accounts  for  the 
mixture  in  the  same  Surahs  of  matter  belonging  to 
different  years  :  as  in  Surah  iii.  there  are  verses  which 
must  have  been  delivered  in  the  third  year  of  the 
Hijrah,  commenting  on  the  battle  of  Uhud,  to  which 
are  prefixed  a  series  of  verses  clearly  dealing  with 
Christian  controversy,  and  doubtless  rightly  assigned 
to  a  much  later  period.  The  text  which  claims  to  be 
the  last  in  the  Koran,  "  This  day  I  have  completed 
your  religion,"  is  not  put  at  the  end  but  in  the 
middle  of  the  volume.  The  verse  which  has  every 
appearance  of  being  the  first  text  revealed  is  stowed 
away  not  far  from  the  end,  and  evidently,  short  as  is 
the  Surah  wherein  it  is  inserted,  mixed  with  matter 
belonging  to  a  different  period.  We  cannot  say 
either  why  in  certain  cases  several  texts  are  put 
together  to  form  a  chapter,  whereas  towards  the  end 
of  the  volume  we  have  a  series  of  Surahs  limited  to 
a  very  few  verses  apiece. 

Since  the  collector  of  the  Koran  left  no  memoirs 
and  composed  no  preface,  we  do  not  otherwise  know 
precisely  how  he  worked,  or  on  what  principle  he 
admitted,  arranged,  and  generally  dealt  with  his 
matter.  We  know  that  some  portions  of  the  Koran 
must  have  been  taught  for  ritual  purposes,  but  can- 
not say  exactly  which.  From  a  story  to  the  effect 
that  'A'ishah,  when  quoting  the  Koran  at  her  trial,  had 
forgotten  the  name  of  Joseph's  father,  we  should 
gather  that  the  Surah  of  Joseph,  perhaps  the  most 


32    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

continuous  of  the  whole  series,  was  famiharly  known 
at  the  time,  yet  not  so  famiharly  but  that  a  member 
of  the  Prophet's  household  might  be  only  moderately 
well  acquainted  with  its  contents.  But  though  we 
are  unable  to  pronounce  on  the  skill  displayed  by  the 
editor  of  the  Koran,  there  is  a  strong  probability  that 
most  of  the  matter  which  he  collected  had  been 
actually  delivered  by  the  Prophet.  The  case  which 
has  been  quoted,  where  the  utterance  of  one  Surah 
is  confirmed  by  another,  and  apologised  for  in  a  third 
and  a  fourth,  gives  the  very  strongest  presumption  of 
genuineness.  Moreover,  the  controversies  wherewith 
it  largely,  or  rather  mainly,  deals  were  stale  at  the  time 
when  the  collection  was  made.  Much  of  it  deals  with 
Jewish  controversy  ;  the  Judaism  of  Arabia  had  been 
effectively  silenced  by  the  Prophet  before  the  taking 
of  Meccah.  The  prophecy  in  Surah  iii.  that  the 
Jews  would  be  humiliated  was  fulfilled  before  the 
Prophet's  time  in  Medinah  had  half  expired ;  the 
flourishinof  Jewish  communities  had  been  extermi- 
nated  or  impoverished.  Both  the  admiration  and  the 
denunciation  of  the  Banu  Israil,  with  which  so  many 
of  the  Surahs  deal,  had  sunk  from  the  region  of 
practice  to  that  of  reminiscence  or  of  theory,  ever 
since  the  battle  of  the  Trench.  Scarcely  less  out  of 
date  was  the  polemic  against  idolatry  ;  for  by  the 
Prophet's  death  the  idols  had  been  destroyed,  and 
though  we  hear  of  false  prophets  arising  in  Arabia, 
and  of  rebellion  against  the  Medinese  yoke,  there 
appears  to  have  been  no  recrudescence  of  paganism. 
Only  in  one  case  do  we  find  that  the  collector  of 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        33 

the  Koran  embodied  what  looks  Hke  a  state  paper, 

viz.  the  manifesto  to  the  Arabs  which  forms  at  any 

rate   the    commencement   of  Surah   ix.,    which,    for 

some  reason,  lacks  the   invocation   that   is   prefixed 

to   all   the  other   Surahs.     It   calls   itself  "  Licence 

issued  by  Allah  and  His  Apostle  to  the  Pagans  with 

whom  you  have  made  a  covenant,"  and  is  evidently 

a  copy  of  an  actual  document  sent  to  Meccah.     The 

co-ordination  of  Allah  and  the  Apostle  as  authors  of 

the  document  is  unique,  and  makes  it  appear  that  in 

the  period  when  it  was  issued  the  Koran  had  come 

to  be  considered  as  the  Prophet's  official  utterances ; 

and  that  the  theory  of  double  personality,  according 

to  which  the  Prophet  at  times  represented  the  Deity 

and  at  other  times  himself,  yet  was  to  be  obeyed  in 

the  latter  capacity  no  less  than  in  the  former,  was 

making  its  appearance.     So  far  as  this  manifesto  is 

in  the  name  of  the  Prophet  it  should  perhaps  have 

found  no  place  in  the  Koran.     Elsewhere  it  is  hard 

to   say  to   what   extent   manuscript   materials  were 

employed. 

Our  belief,  then,  in  the  general  genuineness  of  the 

Koran  rests  on  the  agreement  of  its  contents  with 

what  would  be  expected  if  the  account  of  its  genesis 

and  collection  were   true.     The  greater  part  of  the 

collection  is  likely  to  have  been  delivered  orally,  and 

indeed  the  matter  is  declared  to  have  been  sent  down 

to  the  Prophet's  heart  to  deliver  with  his  tongue. 

The  material  was,  as  perhaps  is  the  case  with  most 

preachers,  meagre ;   he  was   acquainted  with  only  a 

few  stories,  and  the  doctrines  which  he  had  to  com- 

3 


34    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

municate  were  during  a  long  period  exceedingly  simple. 
Whether  improvised  or  prepared,  and  probably  both 
methods  were  employed,  these  discourses  impressed 
many  hearers,  and  were  recollected  in  different  forms. 
In  accounts  of  dialogues  and  public  discourses,  both 
real  and  fictitious,  we  find  authors  who  lived  before 
the  invention  of  printing  speak  of  the  report  as  put 
together  from  the  accounts  of  hearers,  and  we  not 
unfrequently  meet  the  assumption  that  a  hearer  of 
an  oration  will  remember  it,  and  be  able  to  repeat  it. 
Such  reports  of  the  Prophet's  sermons  must  have 
been  found  in  the  minds  or  hands  of  various  Believers, 
and  in  the  later  Medinese  period  a  reading  public 
may  have  begun  to  exist. 

The  Koran,  then,  was  what  remained  to  take  the 
place  of  the  Prophet,  and  the  dead  letter  is  a  poor 
substitute  in  any  case  for  the  living  voice.  In  the 
Prophet's  time  the  divine  ordinances  could  be  changed 
from  day  to  day ;  after  his  death  they  became  stereo- 
typed for  ever.  "  Do  you  doubt,"  asks  a  catechist 
rather  more  than  a  hundred  years  after  that  event, 
"  that  the  Koran  was  brought  down  to  the  Prophet 
by  Gabriel  the  faithful  spirit :  that  therein  God  had 
declared  what  is  lawful  and  unlawful,  prescribed  His 
rules  and  established  His  practices,  and  told  the  history 
of  the  past  and  of  the  future  to  the  end  of  time  ? "  ^ 
The  catechumen  replies,  "  I  doubt  not."  This  parti- 
cular sect  held,  indeed,  that  there  was  somewhere  an 
esoteric  tradition  whereby  it  could  be  supplemented, 
some  person  or  persons  who  might  deal  with  it  some- 

1  Tabari  ii.  I96I. 


THE   KORAN    AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        35 

what  as  the  Prophet  had  dealt  with  its  divine  original ; 
but  the  greater  part  of  Islam  rejected  this  doctrine, 
and  so  closed  the  avenue,  little  used,  it  must  be 
admitted,  to  possible  improvements.  Yet  in  some 
way  the  community  had  to  be  supplied  with  some- 
thing more  than  was  contained  in  the  fragments 
put  together  by  the  first  Caliph's  order:  with  law, 
ritual,  morals,  theology,  and  even  history.  The  task 
before  us  is  to  trace  these  several  supplements  to 
their  source. 


LECTURE  II 

THE    KORAN    AS    THE    BASIS    OF    ISLAM    [continued) 

Some  twelve  years  are  said  to  have  elapsed  between 
the  collecting  of  the  Koran,  which  is  supposed  to  have 
been  executed  by  order  and  for  the  use  of  the  first 
successor  of  the  Prophet,  and  the  issuing  of  an  official 
edition.  In  the  meantime  it  would  appear  that  un- 
official texts  must  have  been  promulgated,  of  which, 
however,  little  more  than  the  rumour  reaches  us ; 
different  families  were  supposed  to  possess  their  own 
recensions,  and  this  was  likely  to  lead  to  serious  mis- 
chief. The  third  successor  of  the  Prophet  had  all 
these  texts  collected  and  either  burned  or  washed  out 
— a  more  economical  process,  permitting  the  use  of 
the  material  for  some  other  purpose ;  in  their  place 
authorised  copies  were  sent  to  the  chief  Islamic  cities. 
It  is  asserted  that  even  the  fair  copy  which  had  been 
made  by  the  second  successor,  and  after  his  death  had 
got  into  the  possession  of  his  daughter,  was  obtained 
from  her  heir  and  destroyed.  So  valuable  a  relic 
would  not  have  been  so  treated  had  not  its  preserva- 
tion been  dangerous  to  someone.  Little  is  said  by 
the  Islamic  historians  of  this  act,  which,  however,  must 
have  been  in  the  highest  degree  sensational ;  for  the 

36 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        37 

Koran-readers  were  developing  into  a  profession,  and 
doubtless  possessed  in  their  Korans  a  lucrative  asset. 
Yet  since  the  destruction   of  the  earlier  copies  was 
effectively  carried  out,  the  Moslems  are  compelled  to 
assume  that  the  text  which  remains  is  authoritative ; 
for  otherwise  they  would  be  casting  doubts  on  the 
basis  of  their  system.     The  act  of  Othman  is  there- 
fore commended  by  the  historians  who   mention  it, 
and  the  use  of  non-Othmanic  readings  was  afterwards 
punishable  with  death  ;  ^  though  whether  his  contem- 
poraries  regarded    it  in    the    same    light    may   well 
be  doubted.     Among   the    charges    brought   against 
Othman  by  those  who   afterwards  besieged  him  in 
Medinah  and  murdered  him,  one  is  that  he  found  the 
Korans  many  and  left  oner  and  that  he  had  ''torn 
up  the   Book " ;  ^  and   for   a  long   time   his  enemies 
called  him  "the  tearer  of  the  Books." ^     The  party 
who  are  associated  with  his  assassination  are  some- 
times called  "the  Readers."^     The  reason  alleged  for 
this  drastic  measure  is  the  fear  that  different  readings 
would  lead  to  the  development  of  sectarianism,  this 
having  happened  in  the  Christian  Church ;  although 
it  might  not  be  easy  to  demonstrate  that  the  various 
readings  of  the  Bible  had  effected  much  in  this  direc- 
tion ;  and  Othman 's  expedient  by  no  means  proved 
itself  effective,  since  sects  developed   in  Islam  with 
great    rapidity.     The   story   of    the    destruction    of 

1  Yakuts  Dictionary  of  Learned  Men,  vi.  300 j  499. 

2  Tabari  i.  2952,  10.  3  /^^-^.^  jj,  51 6,  5. 
4  Ibid.,  ii.  747,  anno  67. 

^  i.  3323,  15.     The  charge  that  he  was  the  first  who  altered  the 
Prophet's  sumiah  seems  an  echo  of  this.     Aghani  xx.  101,  14. 


38    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

Omar's  copy  suggests  that  the  official  edition  con- 
tained matter  which  current  copies  did  not  contain ; 
and,  indeed,  we  may  easily  believe  that  the  text  did 
not  escape  interpolation  during  the  period  which 
separated  the  ultimate  edition  from  the  original  col- 
lection.^ The  first  successor  is  said  to  have  composed 
a  text  wherein  the  Prophet's  death  is  foretold,  and  a 
little  tampering  with  the  sacred  volume  is  likely  to 
have  been  executed  from  time  to  time.  Some  verses 
which  give  the  appearance  of  being  post-Mohammedan 
are  a  set  which  recognise  a  distinction  between  two 
classes  of  texts  in  the  Koran :  those  which  have  been 
revised  and  those  which  are  equivocal.  This  division 
seems  unnecessary  when  the  doctrine  of  abrogation 
has  been  adopted ;  nor  while  the  Prophet  lived  can 
we  well  believe  that  any  portion  of  the  Koran  was 
equivocal,  for  he  was  there  to  interpret  it.  Further, 
the  word  "  clear "  or  "  perspicuous,"  used  as  the 
contrary  of  "  equivocal,"  is  so  frequently  employed  of 
the  Koran  that  he  would  probably  have  disapproved 
the  use  of  the  latter  term  except  in  the  sense  of 
"  uniform,"  in  which  signification  it  is  indeed  applied 
to  the  Koran  as  a  whole. 

Besides  this,  the  Koran  is  treated  as  a  unit,  which 
it  can  never  have  been  while  the  Prophet  lived :  the 
well  of  revelation  had  not  then  run  dry.  Further,  the 
revised  texts  are  here  said  to  be  the  "  Mother  of  the 
Book  "  ;  but  that  phrase  as  used  by  the  Prophet  means 

^  One  sect  of  Khawarij  declared  Surah  xii.  (Joseph)  spurious. 
Ghunyah  i.  76.  The  Ibadites  charge  Othman  with  having  ""  altered 
God's  word."     Sachau,  Anschauungen  der  Ibaditen,  p.  53. 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        39 

something  very  different,  viz.  the  divine  original,  the 
copy  in  the  possession  of  the  Celestial  Author,  who  is 
at  liberty  to  revise  as  He  will.  Hence  this  passage 
seems  intended  to  deal  with  difficulties  which  can 
scarcely  have  cropped  up  while  the  Prophet  lived,  but 
necessarily  arose  when  the  letter  had  to  take  the  place 
of  the  living  intermediary  between  God  and  man. 

A  controversy  on  which  we  never  seem  to  hear  the 
last  word  is  whether  or  not  the  Alexandrian  library 
was  burned  by  the  Moslem  conquerors ;  and  even  as 
late  as  1912  some  severe  language  has  been  heard 
about  it.  The  real  difficulty  about  the  story  is — 
What  is  meant  by  the  Alexandrian  library  ?  but  the 
important  question  from  some  points  of  view  is 
whether  the  belief  that  the  Koran  rendered  all  other 
literature  dangerous  or  superfluous  was  or  was  not 
current  at  the  time  when  this  disaster  is  supposed  to 
have  taken  place.  Now,  that  the  Moslems  wilfully  7 
destroyed  books  belonging  to  other  communities, 
composed  in  foreign  languages,  is  not  credible ;  they 
would  not  have  regarded  the  preservation  of  such 
literature  as  a  matter  affecting  themselves.  But  the 
rise  of  the  Islamic  state  was  an  occasion  which  would 
naturally  have  produced  a  mass  of  literature,  each 
person  recording  what  he  knew  of  the  remarkable 
man  who  had  founded  the  Arabian  empire,  or  of  the 
campaigns  which  had  brought  such  brilliant  results ; 
yet  those  who  in  later  times  endeavoured  to  discover 
what  was  the  first  book  written  after  the  Koran  give 
us  a  selection  of  authors  whose  death-dates  come 
between   the  years   149-160  of  the  Migration ;  and 


40    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

though  a  work  by  an  author  who  died  m  110  is  some- 
times mentioned,  it  would  seem  that  its  genuineness 
is  ordinarily  denied.  Of  those  prose  works  which  have 
come  down  to  us,  little  is  earlier  than  150,  and 
literature  begins  to  accumulate  in  masses  only  after 
another  decade  or  two.  Thus  the  first  actual  treatises 
on  jurisprudence  as  a  science  were  those  of  Shafi'i, 
who  flourished  in  the  second  half  of  the  second 
century ;  previously  the  science  had  been  locked  up 
with  its  possessors.^ 

Considerable  vagueness,  in  consequence,  attaches 
to  the  history  of  the  first  century  and  a  half,  and  even 
in  the  case  of  events  of  primary  importance  we  are 
confronted  with  puzzles.  We  cannot,  however,  credit 
the  whole  Moslem  population  with  inability  to  express 
themselves  otherwise  than  in  lyric  verse.  The  long 
silence  of  the  Arabs  under  Islam  is  to  be  accounted 
for  by  the  importance  attached  to  the  Koran,  which, 
it  was  thought,  no  more  tolerated  other  books  beside 
itself  than  Allah  tolerated  other  deities.  The  claim 
which,  according  to  the  story  of  the  Alexandrian 
library,  was  made  by  Omar  for  the  Koran  does  not 
exceed  what  it  claims  for  itself.  It  is  "a  detailed 
account  of  everything."^  It  was  delivered  in  a  night 
wherein  every  difficult  matter  was  distinguished.^ 
"We  have  neglected  nothing  in  the  Book."^  Now, 
a  "  detailed  account  of  everything,"  "  a  Book  wherein 
nothing  is  neglected,"  clearly  renders  all  other  litera- 

1  Yakut  vi.  388.       In  the  Ihya  al-^Ulum  i.  65  this  matter  is  dis- 
cussed ;  see  also  Ithaf  i.  434. 

2  Surah  xii.  111.  3  xHv.  3.  *  yi  33. 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS  OF   ISLAM 


41 


ture  superfluous  or  dangerous ;  and,  indeed,  when 
Bonaparte  asked  some  sheikhs  whether  the  Koran  in 
its  complete  account  of  everything  included  formulae 
for  the  casting  of  cannon  and  making  of  gunpowder, 
they  had  to  reply  that  it  did,  though  they  admitted 
that  not  every  reader  would  know  how  to  find  them. 
Hence,  it  would  seem,  Moslems  were  precluded  from 
composing  books,  and  references  to  others  than  the 
Koran  in  the  early  generations  of  Islam  are  rare. 
Such  references  are  usually  to  such  as  contained 
oracles  ;  thus  a  son  of  the  conqueror  of  Egypt,  when 
in  that  country,  read  the  works  of  Daniel,  and  made 
prophetic  calculations  on  its  data ;  ^  but  even  these 
books  appear  to  be  ordinarily  in  the  hands  of  Jews  and 
Christians,^  or  in  those  of  converted  Israelites,  who 
may  have  retained  them  from  their  earlier  days.^ 
Even  letters  were  ordinarily  brief  or  rather  laconic ; 
the  first  author  of  prolix  epistles  comes  into  history 
in  the  year  60,  only,  however,  to  have  his  despatch 
rejected  for  one  which  was  conciser/  Attempts  at 
preserving  history  seem  to  have  taken  the  form  of 
tribal  narratives,  to  which  reference  is  sometimes 
made ;  ^  these  were  recited  in  the  home,^  or  more 
often  in  the  mosques,  and  at  times  some  particular 
mosque  was  a  favourite  resort  of  such  narrators.^ 

These  narrators  are  not  easily  distinguished  from 
preachers,  who  (sometimes  after  the  afternoon  prayer^) 


1  Tabari  ii.  399,  anno  ^1. 

2  Ihid.,  ii.  786,  anno  68. 
5  Ibid.,  ii.  856,   1180. 

7  Ibid.,  ii.  455,  656. 


2  Ibid.,  ii.  1138,  1464. 

4  Ibid.,  ii.  270  (^Amr  b.  Nafi^. 

^  Ibid.,  ii.  1919. 

8  Ibid.,  ii.  1968. 


42    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

were  employed  by  commanders  to  inspirit  the  troops 
by  recounting  to  them  the  wars  of  the  Lord  and  the 
merits  of  the  Holy  Family.^  Probably  it  was  in  the 
recitations  of  these  "  narrators,"  as  they  were  called, 
that  the  bulk  of  the  Prophet's  biography  was  preserved, 
whence  the  ordinary  Moslem  obtained  a  general  ac- 
quaintance with  it  and  would  understand  allusions 
to  its  details.^  The  profession  of  "  narrator  "  does 
not  appear  to  have  been  originally  distinct  from  that 
of  Koran-reader  and  jurist.^  A  jurist  was  the  author 
of  one  of  the  earliest  attempts  at  written  history  of 
which  we  hear,  viz.  a  list  of  the  Caliphs  with  their 
ages;  though  its  author  died  as  early  as  124  a.h., 
many  of  his  figures  were  uncertain ;  ^  and  contra- 
dictory accounts  have  been  handed  down  to  us  with 
respect  to  the  dates  of  highly  important  events.  In 
general,  if  anything  was  taken  down,  the  copy  would 
appear  to  have  been  retained  only  until  its  contents 
had  been  committed  to  memory ;  and  the  author  of 
this  chronological  table  is  said  to  have  been  ex- 
ceptional in  taking  down  matter  that  was  not  strictly 
juristic.^  He  became,  indeed,  thereby  the  greatest 
scholar  of  his  time ;  but  it  was  not  in  his  power  to 
compensate  for  the  want  of  contemporary  histories, 
or  to  discriminate  between  the  basis  of  fact  and 
the  accumulations  brought  about  by  the  process  of 
narration. 

The  notion  that  the  sacred  book  is  the  whole  of 

1  Ta])an  ii.  9^9,  950,  1055.     ^  /^^^^^  n   931^  1226,  1242,  1338. 
3  ibid.,  ii.  1086.  4  K^id^^  n  428. 

^  Jahiz,  Bay  an  ii.  26. 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        43 

the  national  literature  has  been  too  often  current  for 
us  to  be  surprised  at  the  Moslems  adopting  it.  A 
Koranic  theory  is  that  every  nation  has  its  book — 
naturally  one  only.^  With  whatever  sanctity  a  text 
may  be  surrounded,  probably  the  only  way  to 
effectually  guard  it  against  rivals  is  to  prevent  the 
possibility  of  rivalry.  The  Jews  interpreted  a  verse 
near  the  end  of  Ecclesiastes  as  definitely  forbidding 
the  addition  of  anything  to  their  national  literature  ; 
and  for  three  parts  of  a  millennium  they  observed 
this  precept  faithfully.  Hence  the  national  history 
of  that  race  between  the  fall  of  Jerusalem  and  the 
foundation  of  Baghdad  is  a  blank.  The  Apocalypse 
ends  with  a  terrible  threat  against  those  who  venture 
to  make  any  addition  to  the  prophecy  of  this  book, 
which  may  indeed  refer  to  that  particular  collection 
of  oracles,  but  is  quite  likely  to  be  interpreted  of 
putting  anything  at  all  that  is  to  be  permanent  on 
writing  material.  Possibly  there  were  fewer  scruples 
among  Moslems  about  the  writing  of  poetry,  to  which 
there  are  occasional  allusions,^  since  such  compositions 
were  by  their  form  clearly  distinguished  from  the 
Koran.  We  have  seen  that  some  scruples  were  felt 
about  collecting  the  Koran  itself;  it  need  not  then 
surprise  us  that  there  were  yet  greater  scruples  about 
collecting  anything  else.  And  if,  as  was  the  case, 
even  those  Scriptures  which  the  Koran  professed  to 
confirm  and  corroborate  might  not  be  put  into  the 
hands  of  Moslems,  still  less,  we  can  imagine,  might 
any  other  form  of  literature ;  though  it  seems  clear 

1  Surah  xlv.  27.  2  Tabari  ii.  1732. 


44    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

that  the  Prophet  had  no  idea  that  any  other  form  of 
literature  existed.  But  even  had  he  known  of  it,  it 
is  improbable  that  his  attitude  would  have  been 
altered  thereby  ;  for  his  system,  as  might  be  expected 
of  a  man  who  was  by  instinct  a  mihtary  commander, 
was  decidedly  one  of  short  cuts.  This  appears  clearly 
in  his  calendar.  The  brains  of  mathematicians  and 
astronomers  had  been  wearied  with  endeavours  to 
find  a  formula  which  would  harmonise  the  supposed 
motions  of  the  sun  and  the  moon  ;  Mohammed  settles 
the  whole  difficulty  in  a  moment  by  declaring  that 
the  year  in  God's  estimation  is  one  of  twelve  lunar 
months.  Christianity  had  been  rent  to  pieces  with 
the  difficulty  of  formulating  the  nature  of  Christ, 
whose  mother,  it  was  agreed,  was  a  virgin  ;  ]\Ioham- 
med  settles  the  matter  straight  off:  the  nature  of 
Christ  is  like  that  of  Adam.  Now,  when  difficulties 
can  be  settled  with  this  directness,  clearly  research  is 
useless  ;  for  the  students  of  these  matters  had  arrived 
at  nothing  so  simple.  And  the  Koran  makes  state- 
ments on  so  many  subjects  that  its  claim  to  settle 
everything  is  at  least  plausible.  We  can  learn  from 
it  where  the  sun  sinks,  and  where  it  rises ;  that  the 
period  from  birth  to  weaning  is  two  years,  and  from 
conception  to  weaning  thirty  months  ;  besides  a  precis 
of  Old  Testament  and  New  Testament  history,  it  is 
generally  encyclopaedic  in  its  range  of  information. 

But  whether  the  collection  of  Surahs  was  intended 
as  a  manual  of  either  ritual  or  law,  civil  and  criminal, 
or  of  ethics,  its  utility  was  decidedly  limited.  In  the 
first  place,  there  is  no  principle  of  arrangement,  whence 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        45 

the  whole  book  must  be  perused  in  order  to  find  the 
enactment  on  any  subject.  In  the  second  place,  the 
enactments  on  the  same  subject  are  apt  to  be  numerous 
and  contradictory.  We  may  take  the  case  of  lawful 
foods.  In  Surah  xxii.  certain  beasts  are  declared  lawful, 
"  except  what  shall  be  read  unto  you  " — where  there 
is  thus  a  promise  of  further  information.  In  Surah 
xvi.  116  such  information  is  given:  here  the  excep- 
tions are  four — "  God  has  made  unlawful  for  you 
that  which  has  died  a  natural  death,  blood,  swine's 
flesh,  and  what  has  been  consecrated  to  any  other 
than  Allah."  It  must  be  confessed  that  the  classifica- 
tion leaves  something  to  be  desired  ;  and,  indeed,  some 
argued  that  the  fat  of  swine  was  lawful  according  to 
the  wording  of  this  text.  In  vi.  119  we  are  told 
that  the  details  have  been  given,  only  it  is  there 
explained  that  "  what  has  been  consecrated  to  any 
other  than  Allah  "  means  "  what  has  not  had  Allah's 
name  mentioned  over  it."  And  in  verse  146  the 
Prophet  is  told  to  say  that  in  what  has  been  revealed 
to  him  he  finds  nothing  forbidden  save  the  four  things 
mentioned  in  Surah  xvi.  In  Surah  ii.  168  the  same 
list  is  given  again.  In  Surah  v.,  however,  the  first 
verse  tells  us  that  graminivorous  beasts  are  lawful 
food,  except  what  shall  be  read  unto  you,  and  the 
list  follows  in  verse  4 :  but  here  no  fewer  than  six 
fresh  exceptions  are  added.  Since  there  follows  the 
expression,  "  To-day  I  have  completed  for  you  your 
religion,"  it  may  be  reasonably  inferred  that  this  is 
the  final  utterance  on  the  subject  of  lawful  and  un- 
lawful  food ;    but   one   feels    that   the    assertion   in 


46    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

Surah  vi.,  "I  only  find  in  what  has  been  revealed 
to  me,"  followed  by  the  shorter  list,  ought  not  to 
have  been  left  unmodified  by  an  editor ;  for  though 
the  statement  in  Surah  v.  may  well  be  the  final  utter- 
ance on  the  subject,  it  contradicts  Surah  vi.  Since, 
then,  the  verse  in  Surah  vi.  is  abrogated,  it  ought 
either  to  have  been  omitted,  or  some  chronological 
note  should  have  been  appended ;  and,  indeed,  in 
'  Surah  vi.,  which  takes  its  name  from  these  beasts, 
the  author  goes  out  of  his  way  to  give  what  he 
supposes  to  be  the  Jewish  law  as  well  as  that  of  his 
own  community,  and  to  this  revelation  reference  is 
made  in  Surah  xvi. 

Now,  if  on  a  matter  which  admits  of  such  precision 
as  this,  the  ruling  of  the  Koran  is  inconsistent  and 

^  self-contradictory,  we  cannot  reasonably  expect  pre- 
cision on  those  moral  and  metaphysical  questions 
which  taxed  the  ability  even  of  an  Aristotle,  who 
to  his  natural  endowments  had  added  a  long  and 
profound  study  of  the  theory  of  classification. 

To  speak  of  the  metaphysics  of  the  Koran  might 
.  seem  to  be  an  anachronism,  but  the  evidence  which 
justifies  our  using  the  phrase  is  irrefragable.  It  re- 
peatedly attributes  the  unbelief  of  its  opponents  to 
the  act  of  God ;  a  man  s  acceptance  of  Islam  is  said 
to  be  due  to  God's  expanding  his  breast  (vi.  125),  his 
refusal  of  it  to  his  breast  being  straitened :  God  has 
rendered   such   a  person  deaf  and  blind,  and  sealed 

^  up  his  brains  so  that  he  cannot  make  use  of  them. 
Had  God  willed,  everyone  on  earth  without  excep- 
tion would  have  believed  (x.  99) ;  no  soul  can  believe 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE    BASIS    OF   ISLAM        47 

save  by  the  permission  of  God  (100) ;  he,  Mohammed, 
cannot  force  people  to  beheve  ;  his  preaching  would 
be  unavailing  if  God  willed  to  lead  people  astray 
(xi.  36).  It  was  impossible  to  rescue  those  who 
were  doomed  to  punishment  (xxxix.  20).  To  all 
this  there  was  the  obvious  retort  on  the  part  of 
the  Unbelievers  that  they  too  could  not  alter  what 
God  had  decreed  (vi.  149,  xvi.  37);  *' had  God 
willed,  neither  we  nor  our  forefathers  would  have 
been  pagans,  nor  should  we  have  declared  any 
lawful  food  unlawful."  And  this  objection  is  re- 
peatedly recorded.  The  only  reply  that  the  Koran 
can  offer  is  that  Unbelievers  in  old  times  said  the 
same,  and  that  the  people  who  say  this  have  no  real 
knowledge,  but  are  only  guessing. 

With  regard  to  morals  there  is  the  same  difficulty. 
The  Koran  certainly  is  consistent  on  one  point,  the 
first  commandment,  "  Thou  shalt  have  none  other  gods 
but  Me " ;  and  this  is  practically  the  sole  message 
which  all  the  prophets  communicate.  If  we  come  to 
other  commandments,  we  have  to  read  through  the 
whole  work  in  order  to  be  sure  what  is  actually 
meant.  Where  something  analogous  to  a  code  is 
given,  e.g.  in  Surah  vi.  152  and  following.  Surah  xvii. 
24,  XXV.  65  following,  Surah  xxxi.  12,  Surah  xvi.  92, 
the  second  commandment  is  usually  "  kindness  to 
parents " ;  but  then  comes  the  difficulty  noticed  in 
the  case  of  Abraham :  what  happens  if  the  parent  is 
an  Unbeliever  ?  In  Surah  xxix.  7  the  injunction  is 
followed  by  the  rider,  "But  if  they  urge  thee  to 
associate  with  Me  that  concerning  which  thou  hast 


48    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

no  knowledge,  then  obey  them  not";  in  xxxi.  14 
there  is  added  to  this,  "But  associate  with  them 
kindly."  But  in  Surah  Ix.,  when,  owing  to  the 
Migration  and  the  battle  of  Badr,  this  matter  has 
assumed  serious  proportions,  the  JNloslems  are  told 
to  declare  that  there  is  perpetual  enmity  between 
them  and  the  Unbelievers,  whatever  the  relationship ; 
Abraham's  promise  to  pray  for  his  father  is  stated  to 
be  an  exception  which  is  not  to  be  imitated. 

We  see,  then,  that  the  second  commandment  has 
had  to  undergo  serious  alteration  as  time  goes  on  ; 
and  without  the  theory  of  abrogation  it  is  impossible 
to  make  use  of  Koranic  rulings  on  the  commandment 
concerning  the  honour  due  to  parents.  With  other 
commandments  we  can  trace  the  same  process.  In 
the  code  of  Surah  xvi.  93  there  is  a  commandment 
to  keep  oaths  ;  but  in  Surah  v.  91  this  rule  is  modified 
by  the  introduction  of  the  principle  of  compensation, 
whereby  the  violation  of  an  oath  may  be  atoned  by 
some  other  performance ;  and  in  Surah  Ixvi.  this 
new  principle  is  confirmed  and  applied  to  a  case 
wherein  the  Prophet  himself  is  concerned.  The 
tendency  here,  then,  as  in  the  former  case,  is  towards 
laxity ;  and  it  has  had  the  decidedly  serious  result 
that  there  appears  to  be  no  mode  known  to  Moham- 
medan law  whereby  an  oath  can  be  made  legally 
binding ;  for  not  only  does  the  Koran  expressly  state 
that  the  performance  of  certain  charitable  acts  will 
serve  as  a  substitute  for  specific  performance,  but  the 
Prophet  is  credited  with  the  maxim  according  to 
which  if  a  man  having  taken  an  oath  to  do  some- 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF    ISLAM        49 

thing  discovers  some  preferable  course,  he  is  to  take 

that  preferable  course  and  make  compensation.     And, 

indeed,  the  jurists  appear  to  devote  their  attention 

entirely   to   the   nature   of  the    compensation  to  be 

adopted  in  such  cases,  without  disputing  the  legality 

of  perjury.     It   cannot,  however,  be  easily  believed 

that  the  Prophet  would  have  failed  to  see  the  danger 

of  admitting   this   principle    unrestrictedly,    though 

there   may  be   cases   in   which   the   existence  of  an 

authority   empowered    to    release    men    from    such 

obligations  is  conceivably  desirable. 

If  in   lieu   of  a   code   we    endeavour    to    collect 

occasional  precepts  or  to  analyse  the  general  spirit 

of  the   Koran,   the  result  is    somewhat   wanting   in 

precision  and  consistency.     It  is  clearly  an  untenable 

view  that  the  moral  law  can  vary  with  the  varying 

conditions  of  an  individual  or  of  a  community ;  it 

may  be  wise  to  fight  with  Unbelievers  only  when 

there  is  a  good  chance  of  defeating  them,  but  the 

question  whether  it  is  right  or  not  to  do  so  cannot 

be  settled  on  this  ground.     On  this  subject,  however, 

we  have  a  series  of  utterances  which  steadily  increase 

in  intolerance  until  they  culminate  in  the  ferocious 

document  that  forms    Surah    ix.       We   can   indeed 

gauge  the  agitation  of  the  Prophet  in  that  Surah  by 

the  fact  that  he  mentions  a  battle-field  by  name — 

Hunain  ;   elsewhere  he  uses  veiled  phrases,  e.g.  the 

day  of  Deliverance,  or  the  day  when  the  two  parties 

met.    Similarly,  in  the  disagreeable  episode  connected 

with  his  adopted  son,  he  goes  so  far  as  to  mention 

Zaid  by  name.     Still,  it  is  not  possible  to  harmonise 

4 


50    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

a  precept  which  forbids  any  sort  of  dispute,  a  precept 
which  urges  the  rendering  of  good  for  evil,  and  a 
precept  which  enjoins  the  extermination  of  pagans, 
fighting  with  them  wherever  they  are  to  be  found, 
disregarding  all  family  ties  when  religion  is  con- 
cerned. If  we  admit  the  theory  that  God's  com- 
mands are  dictates  of  prudence,  i.e.  are  temporary 
rules  accommodated  to  the  varying  circumstances  of 
a  few  days  or  years,  the  question  suggests  itself :  did 
circumstances  cease  to  change  on  the  Prophet's 
death  ?  Changing  so  quickly  within  the  twenty 
years  of  his  activity  that  the  rule  which  suited  the 
first  year  was  wholly  inapplicable  in  the  last,  can 
they  in  the  last  year  have  become  so  stereotyped 
that  no  further  alteration  is  required  ? 

Just,  then,  as  we  find  that  metaphysical  difficulties 
are  not  really  abstruse,  but  on  the  surface  as  well 
as  in  the  depth,  so  the  problems  suggested  by  the 
theory  of  revelation  formulated  themselves  even  to 
untrained  minds.  The  Prophet's  answer  is  that  of 
a  dictator,  who  sees  no  difficulty  about  altering  his 
rulings  from  day  to  day  ;  the  texts  which  had  ceased 
to  be  applicable  were  wiped  out,  erased,  and  something 
equally  good  if  not  better  substituted  for  them. 

Even  with  regard  to  ritual  we  are  confronted  by 
the  same  difficulties.  Doubtless  the  Koran  con- 
sistently enjoins  prayer  and  alms,  and  it  certainly 
prescribes  the  pilgrimage  to  the  Ancient  House ; 
yet  it  is  agreed  that  the  Koran  cannot  be  quoted 
for  the  number  and  exact  nature  of  the  ceremonies 
which   together   constitute   prayer,    or    even    for    a 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        51 

complete  definition  of  what  is  meant  by  ceremonial 
washing.  Of  the  system  which  occupies  so  many 
pages  in  the  law-books,  and  of  the  minute  details 
connected  with  this  performance,  only  the  beginnings 
can  be  found  in  the  Koran  ;  and  it  is  by  no  means 
certain  that  the  prescriptions  in  that  book  which 
are  concerned  with  nightly  prayer  are  meant  to 
apply  to  anyone  but  the  Prophet  himself.  Similarly, 
though  charity  is  constantly  enjoined,  and  the  alms 
spoken  of  as  an  institution,  there  is  no  guidance  as 
to  the  amount  to  be  paid.  SKghtly  more  detail 
perhaps  is  given  of  the  ceremonies  connected  with 
the  pilgrimage  which  it  was  the  intention  of  the 
Prophet  to  preserve  or  to  abolish ;  but  even  on  this 
subject  the  statements  are  scanty.  It  is  probably 
true  that  in  the  Prophet's  time  none  of  these 
"pillars  of  Islam,"  as  they  are  termed,  assumed 
quite  as  stereotyped  a  shape  as  that  into  which  the 
studies  of  the  first  century  of  the  Migration  brought 
them  ;  yet  where  the  leading  principle  of  a  system 
is  that  one  particular  teacher  should  be  obeyed  and 
imitated,  the  accurate  formulation  of  duties  is 
evidently  required.  If  prayer  and  alms  are  per- 
formances which  God  demands,  it  becomes  necessary 
to  know  what  constitutes  them ;  where  there  is  a 
claim  to  be  satisfied,  the  debtor  should  know  the 
exact  amount  of  the  claim.  Since  God  is,  according 
to  the  Koran,  "  quick  at  accounts,"  the  debtor  must 
also  have  an  opportunity  of  keeping  his  own. 
Moreover,  the  alms  being  a  tax  which  the  sovereign 
has  to  collect,  its  amount  must  be  definitely  known. 


52    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

In  the  third  place,  it  is  clear  that  the  legislation 
of  the  Koran  is  imperfect,  and  fails  to  deal  with 
numerous  subjects  on  which  rules  are  required. 
Such  a  subject  is  constitutional  law,  the  principle 
whereon  the  ruler  or  sovereign  is  appointed,  and  the 
limits  of  his  power.  When  a  dispute  concerning 
the  succession  arose,  the  only  Koranic  text  which 
seemed  to  deal  with  the  matter  was  one  referring 
to  disputes  arising  between  a  man  and  his  wife,  in 
which  case  an  umpire  was  to  be  appointed  from 
either  side ;  what  was  to  happen  in  the  event  of 
these  umpires  disagreeing  was  not  specified.  Those 
who  were  appointed  to  decide  the  succession  to  the 
throne  were  enjoined  to  settle  the  matter  according 
to  the  Koran,  if  this  were  possible ;  to  do  so  was 
found  quite  impracticable,  though  it  would  appear 
that  one  of  the  parties  endeavoured  to  effect  this 
by  extending  the  principle  of  analogy  which  had 
already  been  employed  in  the  case  of  the  arbitrators. 
It  was  then  argued  that  where  a  murder  had  been 
committed,  "  authority  "  was  given  to  the  avenger  of 
blood,  i.e.  the  kinsman  on  whom  that  duty  naturally 
fell ;  and  the  word  "  authority "  might  conceivably 
apply  to  general  authority,  though  the  context  would 
be  against  this.  The  occurrence,  however,  of  this 
text,  which  might  thus  have  some  bearing  on  the 
question  of  the  successor  to  the  murdered  Othman, 
was  probably  what  encouraged  one  of  the  parties  to 
stake  its  cause  on  the  ruling  of  the  Koran. 

If  the  Prophet's  mission  was  analogous  to  what 
he   supposed   that   of  Jesus  to  have   been,    i.e.    the 


THE  KORAN   AS  THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        53 

relaxation  of  some  parts  of  an  earlier  code,  but  in 
general  the  maintenance  of  it,  it  would  have  been 
natural  for  the  community  to  adopt  the  codes    in 
use  among  either  Jews  or  Christians,  merely  intro- 
ducing  such    changes   as    the    new    revelation    had 
brought.      And,    indeed,   the   academic   question   is 
sometimes   posed :    are   we    bound  by  the  codes  of 
our  predecessors  ?     The  question  is  clearly  academic, 
for  there  is  practically  no  mode  of  getting  at  those 
codes.     The  doctrine  that  the  Jewish  and  Christian 
scriptures   had  been  wilfully   corrupted   beyond   re- 
cognition seems  to  have  become  a  dogma  of  Islam 
at  a  very  early  date :    it  is  the  regular  apology  for 
the  astounding  diversity  of  the  Koran  in  matters  of 
history  from  the  Christian  and  Jewish  documents, 
and  any  system  which  involved  the  employment  of 
those  scriptures  had  necessarily  to  be  rejected.     It 
will   be   seen   that   this   theory   is   actually  made   a 
principle  of  law,  and  regulates  the  relations  of  the 
Moslem  government  with  its  Christian  subjects. 

Still,  though  the  nature  of  the  Koran  was  not  such 
as  to  render  it  a  convenient  handbook  for  consultation 
on  the  various  difficulties  which  arose,  there  were 
certain  sources  of  information  which  for  a  time  might 
be  utilised.  The  Prophet  had  governed  a  community 
a  sufficient  length  of  time  in  a  variety  of  circumstances 
for  the  Moslem  life  to  have  developed  in  a  particular 
way,  and  for  Islam  itself  to  have  exhibited  what  might 
be  called  a  spirit ;  the  Prophet's  career  had  for  some 
years  at  least  been  in  miniature  what  was  to  be  the 
career  of  his  successors :  the  conquest  and  adminis- 


54    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

tration  of  provinces.  And,  on  the  other  hand,  from 
the  different  conditions^, wherein  he  had  hved  with  his 
followers,  there  was  more  than  a  general  notion  current 
of  what  he  approved  and  disapproved.  Victorious 
over  internal  and  external  enemies,  recognised  as 
absolute  dictator  on  all  questions  connected  with 
morality  and  law,  he  had  been  free  to  do  as  he 
liked  ;  there  was  little  reason  to  suppose  that  greater 
success  would  have  seriously  changed  his  methods. 
Hence  there  was  already  a  style  or  system  which 
admitted  of  continuation. 

One  result  was,  then,  to  make  the  Moslems  hero- 
worshippers  to  a  greater  degree  than  any  other 
community  has  attained.  The  Koran  bids  its 
devotees  take  as  their  models  those  who  have  been 
guided,  and  in  particular  urges  that  the  Prophet 
is  a  pattern  of  conduct.  Naturally,  his  immediate 
associates  were  supposed  to  have  resembled  him  most 
closely,  and  what  they  did  became  a  norm  of  conduct 
far  below,  indeed,  that  which  was  attributed  to  the 
Prophet,  but  at  least  analogous  to  it ;  whoso  followed 
their  example  could  not  go  wrong.  This  prin- 
ciple eventually  developed  into  a  cult  of  saints, 
with  numerous  extraordinary  superstitions.  Moslem 
essays  have  a  tendency  to  consist  of  citations  of 
sayings  bearing  on  the  subject  which  are  attributed 
to  the  Companions  of  the  Prophet.  But  though 
much  of  this  matter,  if  not  the  whole  of  it,  is  apo- 
cryphal, we  cannot  doubt  that  the  mode  of  life 
pursued  by  the  Prophet  exercised  a  great  influence 
on  his  environment,  and  the  process  spread  through 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        55 

the  ever-expanding  area  of  Islam.  During  the  early 
generations  the  character  thus  disseminated  was 
fairly  preserved ;  as  time  went  on  and  the  state 
became  more  settled,  it  became  remodelled,  and  its 
old  features  were  blurred  ;  but  some  were  too  clearly 
cut  to  be  rendered  indistinguishable.  And  in  the 
encomia  which  certain  historians  bestow  on  Moslem 
sovereigns,  and  their  assessment  of  the  conduct  which 
they  record,  they  retain  the  old  valuations  derived 
from  a  study  of  the  lives  of  the  Prophet  and  the 
foremost  of  the  Companions. 

If,    leaving    theory,    we    turn    to    practice,    and 
endeavour   to   picture   to   ourselves   the   hfe   of  the 
earhest  Moslems,  the   Companions  of  the  Prophet, 
who   occupy   in   this    system  the   same   place   as   is 
occupied  in  Christianity  by  Apostles  and  Saints,  we 
shall  probably  understand  the  ethical  value  of  the 
Koran  better  than  if  we  study  it  with  orthodox  com- 
mentaries.    These   persons   accepted   the    Koran    as 
guidance  at  the  time  of  its   author  or   at   any  rate 
authorised  expounder.     What  effect  had  it  on  their 
hves  ?     Two  qualities  it  certainly  encouraged  :  courage 
and  discipline.     The  Prophet  spared  neither  himself 
nor   his   followers;    they   fought   many   a   battle   at 
great  odds  and  won.     The  boast  of  the  Koran  that 
a  Believer  was  worth  two  Unbelievers  on  the  battle- 
field, if  not  ten,  justified  itself  repeatedly.     Not  only 
the  Jews,  whose  rehgion  disarms  them,  but  the  legions 
of  the  Greek  and  Persian  empires,  were  unable  to  face 
the  Believers'  onslaught. 

The  heroic  life,  as  depicted  in  the  Greek  Iliad,  bears 


56     EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

a  close  resemblance  to  the  life  of  the  early  Moslems  ; 
they  fight  in  tribes,  and  the  capable  fighter  is  the 
tribal  hero.  Nor  is  the  religious  basis  entirely  dis- 
similar ;  the  loves  and  hates  of  the  fighters  in  both 
cases  are  the  loves  and  hates  of  their  gods.  The  best 
fighter  is  also  the  best  worshipper.  But  it  follows 
from  this  proposition  that  the  best  worshipper  is 
often  the  best  fighter ;  and  the  government  is  to  a 
certain  extent  priestly  in  consequence.  When  the 
Yemenite  tribes  at  Kufah  were  making  common 
cause  against  the  usurper  Mukhtar,  the  rivalry 
between  their  chieftains  was  likely  to  lead  to 
disaster  ;  the  affair  was  settled  by  making  the  chief 
of  the  Readers,  i.e.  the  person  best  acquainted  with 
the  Koran,  leader  of  prayer  and  so  leader  of  the  forces.^ 
The  experiences  of  the  Prophet's  life,  the  constant 
bloodshed  which  marked  his  career  at  Medinah, 
seem  to  have  impressed  his  followers  with  a  pro- 
found belief  in  the  value  of  bloodshed  as  opening  the 
gates  of  Paradise.  Among  the  many  pathetic  stories 
which  Tabari  has  preserved  is  that  of  the  Penitents, 
inhabitants  of  Kufah  who  had  invited  the  Prophet's 
grandson  Husain  to  come  and  be  their  sovereign,  but, 
owing  to  the  vigorous  measures  of  the  Umayyad 
governor  of  Kufah,  left  Husain  in  the  lurch,  who  was 
presently  surrounded  by  the  Umayyad  troops  at 
Kerbela,  where  he  and  many  members  of  his  family 
met  their  deaths.  The  death  of  Husain  has  been  to 
a  large  portion  of  the  Moslem  world  the  analogue  of 
the  Crucifixion :  the  culminating  crime  of  the  whole 

1  Tabari  ii.  654>, 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        57 

world,  too  horrible  to  mention,  yet  always  to  be  kept 
in  mind.  When  these  Penitents  became  conscious 
of  the  offence  which  they  had  committed,  they 
decided  that  they  durst  not  appear  before  their 
Creator  without  having  taken  steps  to  atone  for  it ; 
they  must  take  the  life  of  those  by  whose  hands 
Husain  had  fallen.  When  they  had  taken  this 
resolution,  there  was  already  a  considerable  reaction 
against  the  Umayyads,  for  indeed  the  slaughter  of 
the  Prophet's  household  was  eminently  calculated 
to  produce  one;  the  authorities  in  Kufah  promised 
the  Penitents  their  aid  and  support,  merely  desiring 
that  this  endeavour  to  avenge  Husain  should  be 
undertaken  with  caution  and  prudence ;  only  the 
Penitents  declined.  It  appeared  that  their  desire 
was  far  more  to  lose  their  own  lives  in  the  pursuit 
of  their  aim  than  to  compass  that  aim ;  an  avenue 
to  Paradise  was  opened  to  them,  and  they  hastened 
to  take  it.  On  their  way  to  battle  with  the  Umayyad 
forces  they  met  other  sympathisers,  who  also  urged 
caution,  and  deprecated  unnecessary  waste  of  life, 
and  especially  of  noble  hves ;  the  sympathisers  were 
thanked,  but  their  assistance  and  their  counsel 
dechned.  On  the  battle-field  many  were  offered 
amnesty  by  their  fellow-tribesmen  who  happened 
to  be  in  the  Umayyad  army ;  in  the  cases  quoted 
the  amnesty  was  dechned ;  the  Penitents  fought 
till  they  fell.  Similarly,  we  read  of  generals  who, 
hurrying  to  battle,  asked  their  friends  to  pray  for 
their  martyrdom  ;^  and  of  those  who,  mortally  wounded 

1  Tabari  ii.  644,  l6. 


58    EARLY   DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

in  battle,  expired  congratulating  themselves  that 
they  were  dying  in  the  mode  they  best  desired.^ 
The  Caliph  Ibn  Zubair  finds  consolation  for  the 
death  of  his  brother  on  the  battle-field  in  the  fact 
that  he  is  following  the  family  tradition ;  unlike  the 
Umayyads,  who  regularly  died  in  their  beds.^  Other 
men  as  they  reach  old  age  anxiously  seize  what  may 
be  their  last  chance  of  martyrdom.^  This  spirit  seems 
to  have  regularly  animated  the  Khawarij,  the  most 
ferocious  as  well  as  the  most  pious  of  the  Moslems/ 
They  were  habitually  able  to  defeat  many  times  their 
number  in  consequence.  But  it  also  animated  those 
who  extended  the  Islamic  empire  to  the  far  East/ 

But  beyond  these  virtues,  courage  and  discipline, 
it  might  be  difficult  to  find  any  which  the  Com- 
panions of  the  Prophet  exhibited  above  other  men. 
Temperance,  in  the  sense  of  total  abstinence,  was 
part  of  their  discipline ;  the  amount  of  chastity 
demanded  was  very  slight.  The  ordinary  ills  of 
humanity,  envy,  hatred,  and  malice,  seem  to  have 
been  rife  even  in  the  Prophet's  household,  and  the 
Shi'ites  seem  historically  correct  in  asserting  that 
after  his  death  his  staff  subordinated  all  other  con- 
siderations to  an  intrigue  for  the  succession.  Where 
the  goods  of  infidels  were  in  view,  the  precept  "  Thou 
shalt  not  covet"  does  not  appear  to  have  been  en- 
joined ;  and  the  thirst  at  any  rate  for  infidel  blood 
was  encouraged  rather  than  suppressed.  Those  who 
had  to  deal  with  the  Prophet  or  his  immediate  suc- 

1  Tabarl  ii.  657.         2  li.  819-         ^  ii.  1037. 
4  ii^  1378.  ^  ii.  1604. 


THE   KORAN   AS  THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM         59 

cessors  in  Medinah  had  to  deal  with  an  armed  camp : 
with  a  fighting  force  as  effective  as  has  ever  been 
organised,  when  fighting  depended  not  on  brain 
power  but  on  physical  force.  The  Prophet  rightly 
claims  to  have  set  a  good  example  in  resolution  and 
contempt  of  danger  and  fatigue.  But  that  any  of 
the  gentler  virtues  were  cultivated  does  not  appear ; 
and  the  vices  which  are  associated  with  Asiatic 
despotisms  seem  to  have  displayed  themselves  from 
the  time  when  the  despotism  of  Medinah  was 
founded.  The  Prophet's  successor  and  bosom  friend, 
according  to  the  best  authorities,  deprived  the 
Prophet's  daughter  of  her  property  in  order  to 
avenge  an  insult  which  his  own  daughter  had  received 
some  years  before.  And,  in  general,  little  love  seems 
to  have  been  lost  between  the  Companions  of  the 
Prophet. 

The  shedding  of  blood,  indeed,  became  a  passion 
which  at  times  assumed  strange  shapes.  The  sect  of 
Khawarij  or  professional  rebels,  which  was  called  after 
al-Azrak,  made  a  point  of  killing  women  and  children 
as  well  as  male  Moslems  who  would  not  accept  their 
symbol ;  a  letter  is  extant  wherein  this  practice  is 
justified  from  the  Koran :  these  monsters  spared 
Christians  and  Jews.^  In  the  civil  wars  at  times 
some  of  the  conquerors  could  see  that  the  Moslems 
whom  they  had  defeated  were  brave  men,  who  could 
ill  be  spared  for  the  defence  of  the  frontiers,  and  that 
it  was  improper  to  treat  the  prisoners  of  war  as 
responsible  for  the  deaths  of  the  victor's  comrades  ; 

1  See,  e.s-,  TabarT  ii.  760. 


60    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

but  such  voices  were  rarely  able  to  convince :  the 
thirst  for  blood  was  too  strong.  When  the 
adventurer  Mukhtar  undertook  to  avenge  the  death 
of  Husain,  he  slaughtered  hundreds,  meaning  to  kill 
all  the  troops  that  had  been  engaged  against  Husain ; 
the  real  head  of  the  house  of  Ali  advised  him  to  spill 
less  blood.  A  pious  insurgent  in  the  year  76  advised 
his  leader  to  kill  all  who  disagreed  with  him  before 
even  summoning  them  to  a  change.^  And  some  of 
his  followers  carried  out  this  principle  without  even 
consulting  their  commanders.^  The  less  religious, 
e.g.  the  founder  of  the  Umayyad  dynasty,  seem  to 
have  developed  this  horrible  taste  less  than  the 
devotees ;  but  even  their  record  is  terrible.  We 
cannot  fail  to  find  the  source  of  this  most  painful 
feature  of  Islam  throughout  its  history  in  the 
Prophet's  massacres  of  his  opponents,  and  in  the 
theory  of  the  Koran  that  copious  bloodshed  is 
characteristic  of  a  true  prophet  at  a  certain  stage  of 
his  career. 

Dangerous  consequences  were  drawn  from  the 
Prophet's  doctrine,  emphasised  on  the  occasion  of  a 
domestic  irregularity,  that  an  oath  might  be  cancelled 
by  some  substituted  performance.  According  to  the 
tradition,  one  of  the  Companions  of  the  Prophet, 
Zubair,  who  had  started  the  revolt  against  Ali,  was 
persuaded  by  the  latter  to  abandon  his  project,  and 
gave  what  seemed  a  solemn  oath,  that  he  would  not 
take  part  in  a  war  against  the  Caliph.  Zubair's  son, 
who  afterwards  endeavoured  to  maintain  himself  as 

1  Tabarl  ii.  886.  2  m^  ^  n.  975. 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        61 

sovereign,  persuaded  his  father  to  make  atonement 
for  his  oath  by  freeing  a  slave,  and  take  his  place  in 
the  battle-field  as  if  nothing  had  happened.  The  un- 
scrupulous adventurer  Mukhtar,  who  by  posing  as 
the  avenger  of  Husain  shed  blood  in  rivers,  had  been 
imprisoned  by  the  governor  of  Kufah,  when  some 
suspicion  of  his  plans  leaked  out ;  owing  to  the 
intercession  of  Omar's  highly  respected  son,  the 
governor  was  persuaded  to  give  Mukhtar  his  liberty, 
but  not  before  making  him  take  the  most  solemn 
oaths  that  he  would  not  head  an  insurrection. 
Mukhtar,  we  are  told,  readily  took  the  oaths  offered, 
thinking  to  himself  what  a  fool  the  governor  of 
Kufah  must  be  to  suppose  an  oath  could  make  any 
difference,  when  it  was  so  easy  to  substitute  some 
other  performance  for  it ;  particularly  as  it  might 
easily  be  maintained  that  taking  vengeance  for  the 
death  of  Husain  was  a  duty  which  took  precedence 
of  all  others.  Like  Zubair,  then,  Mukhtar  perjured 
himself  without  scruple.  Yet  in  perjuring  themselves 
they  had  the  authority  of  the  Koran  behind  them, 
and  were  acting  well  within  the  law.  The  oath  of  a 
Moslem  sovereign  or  commander  was  worth  nothing 
at  all,  though  public  opinion  seems  sometimes  to 
have  been  moved  by  very  flagrant  violations. 

Still,  it  is  possible  to  formulate  some  more  general 
theory  of  the  spirit  which  animated  the  Prophet  him- 
self, and  with  which  he  endeavoured  to  impress  his 
followers.  The  political  philosophers  of  the  East 
inform  us  that  men  follow  the  religion  of  their 
sovereigns,  and  imitation  of  the  Prophet,  which  the 


62    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

later  Moslems  carry  on  according  to  their  lights,  is 
repeatedly  enjoined  in  the  Koran.  Certain  rights 
doubtless  belonged  to  his  office,  and  there  are  revela- 
tions which  deal  with  this  matter ;  the  Believers  are 
not  to  treat  him  as  one  of  themselves,  and  are  to 
observe  in  their  dealings  with  him  something  of  the 
etiquette  usual  in  courts.  But,  discovering  what  his 
spirit  is,  they  are  to  animate  themselves  so  far  as 
possible  with  the  same. 

The  spirit  of  Islam  as  it  appears  in  the  Koran 
might  be  said  to  be  Moderation,  Although  the 
Prophet  may  have  had  falsely  attributed  to  him  the 
saying,  "  The  best  of  things  are  the  mean,"  he  would 
probably  have  accepted  the  doctrine  with  little 
hesitation.  With  regard  to  devotional  acts  he  is 
credited  with  the  saying,  "  The  best  religious  observ- 
ance is  the  least  cumbersome,"  and  he  is  supposed  to 
have  forbidden  various  extravagances  in  this  matter. 
Where  charity  towards  relations  and  beggars  is  en- 
joined, the  Koran  adds,  '*  Yet  do  be  not  lavish  ;  the 
spendthrifts  are  brethren  of  Satan,  who  was  un- 
grateful to  his  lord.  Do  not  tie  your  hand  to  your 
neck,  and  do  not  open  it  to  its  full  width  "  (xvii. 
28-31).  In  the  list  of  the  virtuous  (xxv.  67)  are 
those  who  when  they  spend  are  not  lavish  and  not 
stingy,  but  on  the  right  line  between  the  two.  In 
managing  the  goods  of  orphans  the  poor  trustee  is 
told  he  may  take  a  little  for  himself,  but  is  not  to  be 
wasteful  (iv.  6).  If  a  tribesman  has  been  murdered, 
retaliation  is  permissible,  but  the  avenger  of  blood 
should  not  perpetrate  a  massacre  (xvii.  35).     Feasting 


THE   KORAN   AS   THE   BASIS   OF   ISLAM        63 

is  recommended  on  certain  days,  but  there  should 
be  no  excess  (vii.  29).  Chastity  is  repeatedly  recom- 
mended, but  there  is  no  objection  to  unlimited 
concubinage.  The  "  people  of  the  book  "  are  blamed 
for  fanaticism  in  their  religion  (v.  81). 

In  the  time  of  the  Prophet  himself  these  somewhat 
homely  precepts  were  modified  by  the  enthusiasm  of 
fighting  and  conquest.  Although  it  appears  that  he 
fainted  the  first  time  that  he  saw  blood  shed,  he  very 
soon  got  over  that  weakness,  and  probably  was  never 
so  happy  as  on  the  battle-field.  The  portions  of  the 
Koran  which  deal  with  the  sacred  war  exhibit  the 
spirit  which  fills  the  song  of  Deborah,  with  its  scorn 
for  all  weakness  and  irresolution,  its  contempt  of  all 
excuses  for  staying  away  from  the  conflict,  and  its 
admiration  for  those  who  fight  to  the  death,  who 
neither  ask  nor  give  quarter.  And  for  the  rising 
state  this  quality  was  so  desirable  that  the  Prophet 
appears  to  have  pardoned  many  a  peccadillo  in  those 
who  displayed  it  to  the  full.  Like  other  Arab 
chieftains  he  was  perpetually  engaged  in  warfare  ; 
only  by  organisation  and  discipline  he  ensured 
success,  by  fighting  with  a  steady  imperialistic  aim 
he  grew  stronger  instead  of  weaker  after  each  engage- 
ment, and  his  promise  of  Paradise  to  those  who  fell 
evoked  a  kind  of  enthusiasm  which  went  beyond 
anything  which  paganism  had  been  able  to  arouse. 

Down  to  the  end  of  the  Prophet's  life  the  dogma 
of  Islam  was  still  rather  negative  than  positive.  A 
Moslem  was  one  who,  like  Abraham,  was  not  one  of 
the  polytheists  ;  besides  this,  he  was  one  of  those  who 


64    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

feared,  i.e.  were  in  alarm  at  the  prospect  of  the  Day  of 
Judgment.  But  as  regards  other  behefs  and  practices 
he  was  a  follower  of  the  Prophet ;  whatever  orders 
the  Prophet  issued  were  incumbent  upon  him.  Those 
orders,  if  the  Prophet's  biography  may  be  trusted, 
were  not  always  such  as  approved  themselves  to  the 
consciences  of  the  Believers  ;  but  few  of  them  ventured 
to  disobey,  and  those  who  did  venture  were  sternly 
reproved.  Very  little  was  fixed  by  the  time  of  the 
Prophet's  death;  at  best  some  of  the  Companions 
were  in  a  position  to  teach  neophytes  certain  portions 
of  the  Koran,  but  we  cannot  say  how  much  or  what 
portions.  The  whole  fabric  of  behefs  and  practices, 
such  as  fills  many  a  volume,  has  grown  up  since  that 
event.  The  new  religion  ostensibly  took  little  or 
nothing  over  from  older  systems  ;  with  the  difficulty 
which  is  discussed  in  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles,  what 
authority  is  to  be  assigned  to  the  Old  Testament,  a 
matter  which  even  the  Christianity  of  our  day  has  at 
times  to  face,  Islam  was  never  troubled.  The  attitude 
of  the  Jews  in  Medinah  decided  the  Prophet  to  break 
with  them  entirely,  even  to  the  extent  of  denying  the 
authenticity  of  their  scriptures,  and  with  paganism 
he  had  already  broken  ;  to  Christianity  his  debt  had 
at  no  time  been  considerable.  He  had,  therefore,  a 
tabula  rasa  to  write  on,  and  himself  used  the  space  at 
his  disposal  sparingly.  Any  further  writing  upon  it 
might  be  styled  reformation,  since  that  word  signifies 
only  altering  the  shape ;  and  this  might  be  done  in 
many  ways. 


/ 


LECTURE   III 

THE    LEGAL    SUPPLEMENT 

For  the  reasons  that  have  been  given,  the  Koran 
could  not  by  itself  serve  as  a  code,  or  even  as  a  basis 
of  legislation.  And  the  notion  that  any  documents 
other  than  the  Koran  survived  from  the  time  of  the 
Prophet,  and  could  be  used  to  supplement  it,  was 
ordinarily  ridiculed.  When  Ali  was  asked  whether 
he  possessed  any  information  given  him  by  the 
Prophet  other  than  the  Koran,  he  replied,  "  Only  what 
is  in  the  Scroll " ;  this  scroll  contained  the  maxim 
that  Believer  should  not  be  slain  for  Unbeliever,  but 
little  else.^  According  to  another  account,  this  scroll 
was  kept  in  the  sheath  of  the  Prophet's  sword,  and 
Ali's  son  gave  a  very  different  account  of  its  contents.^ 
Possibly  this  scroll  is  identical  with  one  called  the 
Veracious,  which  was  in  the  hands  of  Abdallah,  son 
of  'Amr,  the  conqueror  of  Egypt ;  for  which  a  tradi- 
tionalist said  he  would  not  give  one  farthing.^  A 
document  of  somewhat  greater  importance  was  the 
alms-tariff,  which  was  preserved  in  various  forms  ; 
the  Prophet's  biographer  gives  it  in  the   form  of  a 

1  Umm  vii.  292.  2  /^^v/.,  vi.  3. 

3  Mukhtalif  al-Hadith  9S. 

65  '  5 


66    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

letter  from  him  to  the  Yemenite  commmiities ; 
according  to  others  it  was  a  document  handed  by 
him  to  Abu  Bakr ;  according  to  others  it  was  a 
revelation,  and  as  such  ought  to  have  found  a  place 
in  the  Koran. ^  A  similar  tariff  of  compensation  for 
wounds  was  to  be  found  in  another  letter  of  the 
Prophet,^  which,  however,  does  not  appear  to  have 
been  preserved.  The  jurists  and  traditionalists  when 
they  cite  these  documents  cite  them  by  oral  tradition. 
There  is  no  suggestion  that  the  originals  were  any- 
where preserved,  although  the  work  from  which  the 
references  have  been  taken  was  not  separated  from 
the  supposed  date  of  the  letters  by  two  centuries. 

Since  the  Prophet  described  the  mission  of  Jesus 
as  for  the  purpose  of  removing  some  of  the  restric- 
tions imposed  by  earlier  legislation,  it  is  likely  that 
he  meant  current  practice  to  continue  except  where 
his  legislation  had  abrogated  it.  So  long  as  this 
theory  could  work,  there  were,  then,  two  sources  of 
law  :  custom  and  the  Koran.  We  arrange  them  in 
that  order,  because  the  matters  for  which  the  Koran 
provided  were  limited  in  number.  In  some  of  the 
earliest  occurrences  of  Islam  we  find  custom  further 
defined  as  the  custom  whereupon  people  are  agreed 
rather  than  that  wherein  they  differ.  And  to  some 
extent  the  word  "  custom  "  continued  to  be  employed 
of  various  institutions  which  had  certainly  been  taken 
over  by  Islam  from  the  earlier  practice  of  Arabia. 

The  transformation  of  Arabia  into  an  empire,  and 
the  incorporation  in  Islam  of  numerous  nations  and 

1   Umm  ii.  4.  2  /^^-^^^  ^^  295  .  ^f.  171. 


THE   LEGAL   SUPPLEMENT  67 

communities  with  very  divergent  practice,  rendered 
this  earhest  theory  unworkable ;  for  Arab  governors 
had  to  be  sent  out  to  the  provinces,  and  the  need  for 
uniformity  made  itself  felt.  Hence  a  fresh  source  of 
law  was  required,  and  the  Jewish  theory  suggested  an 
expedient.  The  Jews  have,  as  is  well  known,  two 
laws,  a  Written  Law  and  an  Oral  Law ;  the  latter 
has,  indeed,  for  so  many  centuries  been  committed  to 
writing  that  the  meaning  of  the  word  "  oral  "  in  this 
context  is  often  blurred,  and  the  importance  of  the 
distinction  forgotten.  There  is  strong  reason  for 
believing  that  the  Jewish  Oral  Law  was  still  oral  in 
the  time  of  the  first  Caliphs,  and  even  for  some  time 
later.  Although  this  Oral  Law  in  the  form  wherein 
we  possess  it  consists  of  lawyers'  opinions,  in  theory 
it  was  all  delivered  to  JNloses  on  Sinai.  Hence  the 
conjecture  lay  near  that  Mohammed  had  had  delivered 
to  him  an  Oral  as  well  as  a  Written  Law.  And  the 
doctrine  that  this  second  source  of  law  was  not 
written  or  to  be  written  lasted  for  a  considerable  time. 
The  Prophet  is  said  to  have  forbidden  the  writing  of 
it.^  In  some  dying  injunctions  ascribed  to  a  general 
in  the  year  82  a  man  bids  his  sons  read  the  Koran 
and  teach  the  practice."^  The  general  who  won  the 
throne  for  the  Abbasids  is  said  to  have  heard  from 
his  master  and  have  remembered  traditions.  ^  A  century 
later,  when  at  least  one  corpus  of  tradition  already 
existed,  the  formula  still  is,  "I  have  read  the  Koran 
and  heard  the  tradition  "  ;  ^  but  in  the  third  century 

1  Musnad  of  Ibn  Hanbal  iii.  26.  2  Tabarl  ii.  1083. 

2  ii.  1726.  4  iii,  774. 


68    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

it  runs,  "  I  have  learned  the  Koran  by  heart  and 
written  the  tradition,"  i.e.  copied  it  down  from  some 
teacher's  dictation.^  One  of  the  teachers  of  the 
historian  Tabari  took  the  trouble  to  find  out  whether 
the  pupils  had  committed  to  memory  what  they  had 
written.  It  was,  however,  a  token  of  sanctity  never 
to  be  seen  employing  written  material,^  other,  of 
course,  than  the  Koran  ;  but  in  the  case  of  that  work 
greater  merit  was  acquired  by  reading  than  by  reciting 
from  memory.^ 

Nor  was  it  difficult  to  find  in  the  Koran  itself 
evidence  for  the  existence  of  this  second  source  of 
law.  We  repeatedly  read  of  ''  the  Wisdom  "  as  dis- 
tinguished from  the  Book.  Wisdom  besides  the 
Book  was  given  to  the  Prophets,  and  was  also  re- 
vealed or  sent  down  to  the  Moslems.*  It  is  true 
that  this  Wisdom  seems  in  places  to  be  identified 
with  the  Koran,  and  together  with  the  texts  of  God 
it  was  read  in  the  houses  occupied  by  the  Prophet's 
wives.^  It  might  be  difficult,  even  with  the  most 
careful  consideration  of  the  texts  wherein  this  Wisdom 
is  mentioned,  to  determine  whether  the  Prophet  really 
thought  of  it  as  separate  from  the  Koran  ;  and  on  the 
whole  it  is  probable  that  he  did  not  really  distinguish 
the  two.  The  Koran  is  called  the  Wise  Record,  and 
the  term  muhkam  applied  to  God's  revision  of  the 
texts  points  the  same  way.  Still,  it  was  possible  to 
take  a  different  view  ;  and  in  the  legislation  of  the  end 

1  Yakut  vi.  429.  2  Dhahabi,  Huffaz  i.  303. 

3  Kut  al-Kulub  i.  6l.  ^  ii.  231  ;  iii.  75. 

^  xxxiii.  34. 


THE   LEGAL   SUPPLEMENT  69 

of  the  second  century  of  Islam  we  have  the  definite 
statement  that  the  Wisdom  means  ordinances  made 
by  the  Prophet,  yet  not  embodied  in  the  Koran. 
And  the  texts  wherein  the  Moslems  are  commanded 
to  obey  God  and  obey  the  Prophet  furnished  a  sound 
argument  for  recognising  this  second  source  of  law — 
the  precedents  of  the  Prophet. 

The  process  whereby  "the  beaten  track," ^  '* pre- 
cedent," or  "  custom  "  comes  to  mean  the  precedent 
set  by  the  Prophet  is  just  traceable  in  the  stories 
which  survive  from  the  early  days  of  Islam,  most  of 
them  indeed  somewhat  coloured  by  later  ideas  and 
usage.  Sometimes  the  practice  is  defined  as  "  past 
practice  "  '  or  as  *'  known  practice  "  opposed  to  innova- 
tion,^ or  as  good  practice  opposed  to  bad  practice,* 
or  as  order  opposed  to  disorder.^  Sometimes  the 
"  practices "  are  mentioned  without  further  defini- 
tion,^ but  at  times  they  are  ascribed  to  God,^  to  the 
Moslems,^  to  Islam,^  to  the  first  two  Caliphs,^*^  or  to 
the  first  two  Caliphs  and  the  Prophet ;  ^^  at  times  they 
are  even  mentioned  as  something  over  and  above  the 
practice  of  the  Prophet.^^  In  a  manifesto  ascribed 
to  Ali,  it  is  asserted  that  Allah  taught  the  Arabs 
by  Mohammed  no  fewer  than  four  things — the  Book, 

1  Tabari  ii.  885,  l6.  2  m^^  j  oggg^  ^^ 

3  ibid.,  i.  2937,  15,  3l66,  8,  3298,  9  ;  ii-  240,  19  (spurious  letter), 
984,  14.  Cf.  985,  15. 

4  i.  3044,  9.  ^  ii-  ^^5,   14. 

«  i.  3419,  6;  ii.  1083,  11.  > 

7  i.  3427,  5.  Aghani  xx.  106  ;  TabarT  ii.  518,  14  ;  ii.  1369,  15. 
s  i.  3132,  4,  3228,  15.  9  i.  2929,  18. 

10  i.  2976,  10,  3267;  ii.  1392,  10.    ^  i.  3044,  9. 
12  ii^  1700. 


70    EARLY   DEVELOPMENT  OF   MOHAMMEDANISM 

the  Wisdom,  the  Ordinances,  and  the  Practice.^  In 
a  solemn  address  to  the  founders  of  the  Abbasid 
dynasty,  the  practices  are  said  to  be  contained  in  the 
Koran.^  Nevertheless,  the  "  practice  of  the  Prophet  " 
in  these  stories  is  far  commoner  than  any  other 
phrase.  The  context  in  which  these  expressions  are 
most  frequently  used  is  in  reference  to  the  third 
Caliph,  Othman,  whose  conduct  was  supposed  to 
differ  seriously  from  that  of  his  predecessors  :  though 
the  charges  formulated  against  him  are  always  some- 
what vague.  It  seems  clear  that  the  second  source  of 
law  was  not  yet  anything  quite  definite,  but  merely 
what  was  customary,  and  had  the  approval  of  persons 
of  authority,  all  of  whom  presently  merged  in  the 
Prophet. 

It  might  seem  that  this  was  to  assign  the  Prophet 
a  function  which  he  expressly  disclaimed ;  for  there 
is  little  doubt  that  he  carefully  distinguished  between 
his  utterances  ev  cathedra  and  others.  Where  he  had 
a  revelation  to  guide  him  he  was  infallible,  and  his 
comrades  recognised  that  infallibility;  and  indeed 
the  recognition  of  any  other  sort  could  only  be  made 
at  the  expense  of  the  Koran.  This  sort  of  logic  is 
found  wherever  resort  is  had  to  oracles  ;  it  is  a  con- 
dition of  their  genuineness  and  importance  that  they 
should  not  be  capable  of  explanation  as  the  fruit  of 
ordinary  speculation  ;  hence  those  who  deliver  oracles 
are  madmen,  children,  jesters,  persons  to  whose  re- 
flections no  value  could  be  attached ;  indeed,  the 
tendency    to    accentuate    Mohammed's    illiteracy    is 

1  i.  3236,  13.  2  ii.  1961,  8. 


THE   LEGAL   SUPPLEMENT  71 

evidence  of  the  same  theory.  When  Mohammed 
ruined  a  date-crop  by  strangely  and  capriciously 
forbidding  artificial  fertilisation  of  the  palms,  he 
explained  his  mistake  as  due  to  ignorance ;  he  was 
not  on  that  occasion  delivering  a  revelation.  But 
it  became  necessary  to  supplement  the  Koranic 
legislation  from  his  practice,  and  some  evidence  of 
the  second  function  assigned  to  him,  viz.  of  legislator 
as  well  as  medium,  had  to  be  found  in  the  Koran. 
The  passages  then  cited  for  this  purpose  are  those 
in  which  the  Prophet  is  said  to  have  been  sent  "  to 
read  unto  them  Our  texts,  and  to  teach  them  the 
Book  and  the  Wisdom  and  to  purify  them " ;  and 
indeed  it  is  stated  that  "  God  revealed  unto  thee  the 
Book  and  the  Wisdom  and  taught  thee  what  thou 
hadst  not  known."  Combining  these  statements  with 
the  command  in  the  Koran  to  obey  Allah  and  to  obey 
the  Prophet,  the  jurists  argue  that  what  the  Book 
is  to  Allah,  that  is  the  Wisdom  to  the  Prophet. 

Nevertheless  it  seems  clear  that  is  against  the 
intention  of  the  Koran.  The  Believers  are  told  when 
they  dispute  about  anything  to  "  refer  it  to  God  and 
the  Apostle  "  (iv.  62),  and  the  Hypocrites  are  attacked 
for  declining  an  invitation  to  refer  their  differences 
to  what  God  has  revealed  and  unto  the  Apostle,  and 
told  that  they  will  not  count  as  Believers  until  they 
make  the  Apostle  their  judge ;  they  are  contrasted 
with  those  who  obey  God  and  the  Apostle.  The 
obedience  and  the  belief  are  the  same  :  they  are  con- 
ferred on  the  Apostle  as  the  spokesman  of  God  ;  the 
authority  and  the  spokesman  cannot  be  distinguished. 


\ 


72    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

Probably  the  orthodox  opinion  is  that  the  Prophet's 
ordinances  are  embodiments  of  the  highest  wisdom, 
and  therefore  deserve  the  title  which  is  bestowed 
upon  them  ;  but  there  are  pious  authors  who  admit 
that  this  is  not  necessarily  the  case.  It  is  a  sign  of 
love  of  the  Prophet,  says  a  Sufi  author,  to  prefer  his 
ordinances  to  the  results  of  reason  and  intelligence  :  ^ 
and  this  implies  that  the  two  may  conceivably  be  at 
variance.  Shafi*i  confines  himself  to  the  arguments 
that  have  been  quoted ;  the  injunction  in  the  Koran 
to  obey  the  Prophet,  and  the  declaration  that  one 
who  obeys  the  Prophet  thereby  obeys  God.  To  the 
question  whether  the  name  "  Revelation "  may  be 
applied  to  the  Prophet's  words,  he  declines  to  give  an 
answer.^ 

Professions  develop  by  division  of  labour,  and  it 
must  have  taken  some  generations  to  separate 
the  functions  of  Koran-reader,  Traditionalist,  and 
Jurist.  The  word  which  in  the  Koran  means 
"knowledge"  or  understanding,  but  afterwards 
became  the  technical  term  for  "  law,"  seems  to  have 
specialised  somewhat  slowly.  The  second  Umayyad 
Caliph  uses  it  in  the  sense  "  acquaintance  with  the 
Koran,"  the  only  form  of  book-learning  recognised 
at  the  time.  Husain,  he  said,  had  come  to  grief  on 
the  side  of  his  Jikh,  which  he  explained  to  mean  that 
he  had  forgotten  a  text  in  the  sacred  volume  wherein 
it  is  stated  that  God  assigns  the  sovereignty  to  whom 
He  will.^     It  is  rather  surprising  to  find  a  man  sign 

1  Kut  al-Kulub  ii.  85.  2  Umm  vii.  271. 

3  fabarlii.  381,  2. 


THE   LEGAL   SUPPLEMENT  73 

himself  "the  jurist "  as  early  as  the  year  66,  and  one 
is  inclined  to  fancy  that  the  title  was  given  him  by 
some  later  scribe.^  The  "jurist"  was  still,  as  Tabari 
somewhere  describes  him,  the  pious  man  who  per- 
forms devotional  exercises  in  the  mosque,  and  gives 
legal  opinions  when  asked.^  The  home  of  this 
knowledge,  i.e.  what  the  Prophet  had  said  and  done, 
especially  in  matters  which  bore  any  relation  to  law, 
was  naturally  Medinah,  where  he  had  first  assumed 
the  role  of  ruler  and  judge  ;  and  indeed  the  people  of 
Medinah  had  a  high  appreciation  of  their  acquaint- 
ance with  this  subject,  and  demanded  that  their 
governors  should  consult  them  about  all  cases  which 
came  before  them — a  demand  which  no  other  city 
appears  to  have  made.^  This  demand,  indeed,  some 
of  the  governors  conceded  of  their  own  accord/ 
The  people  of  Medinah  were  long  recognised  as  the 
most  thorough  students  of  the  subject  and  the  most 
careful  to  supplement  omissions.^  We  are  told  that 
the  year  98  was  called  the  year  of  the  Jurists,  because 
the  majority  of  the  Medinese  jurists  died  in  it.  At 
a  later  period  Kufah  obtained  university  rank  in  this 
subject.^  Before  the  close  of  the  Umayyad  period 
every  governor  was  supposed  to  possess  some  legal 
training.'^ 

That   the    Medinese    jurists    obtained   something 
more  from  the  Jews  than  the  mere  idea  of  an  Oral 

1  Sha'bi,  Tabari  ii.  Q\S,  5.  ~  ii.  881  ;  5Q^,  l6. 

3  ii.  1452.  4  ii    2183. 

5  Shafi%  Umm  vii.  242.  ^  Tabari  ii.  1620. 

7  ii.  1837,  126  A.H. 


74     EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

Law  is  very  likely ;  in  one  or  two  cases  the  termin- 
ology of  the  Arabic  jurisprudence  can  be  traced  to 
the   language    of    the    Mishnah.      It    is,    however, 
characteristic    of    Moslem    studies    that   they    take 
very   little   from   outside ;    they    develop    on    inde- 
pendent lines.     And  the  fact   that    Medinah  is  the 
home  of  Moslem  jurisprudence  of  itself  indicates  that 
the  amount   borrowed    from   non-Jewish    sources   is 
likely  to  have  been  exceedingly  small ;  for  Medinah 
was  purely  Arabian   and   Jewish,  and   the   level  of 
cultivation  among   the  inhabitants   decidedly   lower 
than   that    of    Meccah.       As    questions   arose,   the 
persons  to  whom  they  were  referred  were  residents 
in    Medinah,  notably   the   widows    of  the  Prophet, 
because  they  naturally  had  most  acquaintance  with 
the  Prophet's  life.     There  is  no  evidence  that  Roman 
Law  penetrated  into  this  primitive  city ;   when  the 
residents  were  asked  for  legal  opinions,  they  had  to 
rely  on  their  memories,  their  intelligence,  or,  at  best, 
local  talent.     The  Jews  who  had  adopted  Islam  were 
far  better   equipped    than    their   fellow- citizens   for 
practical  jurisprudence,  although  there  is  no  evidence 
that  their  law  was  already  codified  ;  they  had,  how- 
ever, at  their  disposal  the  results  of  reflection  and 
experience  such  as  could  be  applied  in  many  cases. 
And  the  general  method  of  jurisprudence,  principles 
for   reconciling   conflicting    passages    in    the   sacred 
book,    and    deducing   unforeseen   consequences,  had 
undoubtedly    been   elaborated   by   the   Jews    many 
centuries  before  the  rise  of  Islam. 

This,  then,  appears   to   have   been   the  genesis  of 


THE   LEGAL   SUPPLEMENT  75 

the  second  source  of  Law,  which  has  provided  the 
Moslems  with  their  main  occupation.  The  very 
name  "beaten  track"  is  clearly  more  suitable  to 
general  custom  than  to  the  precedents  set  by  a  single 
individual;  the  other  name  ''talk,"  "narrative" 
might  Conceivably  be  regarded  as  a  translation  of  the 
Jewish  phrase  mishnah,  but  it  may  have  arisen  in- 
dependently, in  any  case  in  some  antithesis  with  the 
written  code.  At  the  earliest  period  of  the  civil  wars 
it  appears  to  have  been  recognised  that  conceivably 
neither  the  Koran  nor  any  other  source  of  law 
provided  for  every  emergency  ;  "  This  is  a  new  affair," 
says  a  Companion ;  "  It  never  happened  before  this 
day,  so  that  there  could  be  a  Koranic  revelation  about 
it,  or  a  precedent  in  the  conduct  of  the  Prophet " ;  ^ 
"  They  gave  judgment  without  any  convincing  plea 
or  any  past  precedent,"  complains  another.^  Like 
other  general  negations,  the  former  of  these  proposi- 
tions was  hazardous,  since  methodical  examination 
of  the  Koran  might  find  much  whose  presence  was 
unsuspected  by  the  superficial  student,  whereas  the 
Prophet  might  have  provided  for  the  emergency  by 
some  precept  which  had  escaped  the  speaker's  notice. 
And  indeed  it  was  presently  discovered  that  the 
Prophet  had  foretold  the  future  even  to  the  extent 
of  naming  sects  which  came  into  existence  long  after 
his  death. 

When  this  point  was  granted,  viz.  that  the 
practice  of  the  Prophet  was  no  less  binding  on 
mankind  than  the  legislation  of  the  Koran,  and  that 

1  Tabarl  i.  3l66,  8.  2  md,^  3363^  14. 


76    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

both  were  equally  revelation  dictated  by  God,  but 
merely  differed  in  form — the  one  being  put  by  God 
in  His  own  language,  the  other  communicated  to  the 
Prophet  to  deliver  as  he  chose — there  still  remained 
a  question  as  to  the  relation  between  the  two  forms 
of  Law :  was  the  Prophet's  practice  merely  comment 
upon  the  Koran,  i.e.  limiting  and  explaining,  or  was 
it  supplementary  as  giving  rules  on  subjects  which 
the  Koran  did  not  itself  treat?  Some  certainly 
asserted  that  it  was  all  of  it  of  the  former  sort ;  there 
was  no  ruling  of  the  Prophet  on  any  subject  of  which 
the  basis  was  not  to  be  found  in  the  Koran.  But  this 
proposition  could  not  be  maintained  without  difficulty. 
Between  the  two  forms  of  revelation  there  was, 
however,  one  difference.  It  was  maintained  that 
though  the  Koran  could  abrogate  itself,  it  could  not 
be  abrogated  by  the  Prophet's  practice.  The  argu- 
ments for  this  doctrine  are  Koranic  texts ;  they  are 
taken  from  verses  wherein  God  claims  the  right  to 
alter  the  Koran,  and  asserts  that  when  any  text  is 
abrogated,  one  that  is  better  or  at  least  as  good  is 
substituted.  From  this  it  is  reasonable  to  infer  that 
the  substitute  is  invariably  to  be  got  from  the  Koran 
itself,  and  not  from  the  Prophet's  contributions. 
One  other  text  that  is  quoted  is  less  convincing ;  it 
is  where  the  Unbelievers  request  the  Prophet  to 
produce  a  Koran  different  from  this,  and  he  replies  that 
he  cannot  possibly  alter  it  pi^oprio  motu^  for  if  the 
siinnah  (practice)  be  revelation,  such  an  alteration 
could  not  be  called  2jro/??70  viotu. 

1  X.  16. 


THE   LEGAL  SUPPLEMENT  77 

Shafi'i  quite  correctly  reasons  that  just  as  the 
Koran  can  only  be  abrogated  by  itself,  so  the  sunnah 
can  only  be  abrogated  by  itself.  He  has,  however,  to 
resort  to  the  assumption  that  we  possess  both  the 
Koran  and  the  sunnali  in  their  entirety,  since  other- 
wise there  would  be  a  chance  that  the  abrogated 
verse  might  in  certain  cases  be  preserved,  and  the 
abrogating  lost ;  and  similarly  that  the  abrogated 
practice  had  been  remembered,  but  not  the  abrogating. 

One  of  the  most  important  functions  of  the  sunnah 
is  clearly  to  settle  between  conflicting  texts  which 
abrogate  the  other ;  for,  as  we  have  seen,  the  evident 
intention  of  the  compiler  of  the  Koran  was  to  leave 
this  matter  absolutely  undecided ;  all  suspicion  of 
chronological  arrangement  had  to  be  avoided.  In 
the  cases  to  which  reference  was  made  above,  it  was 
clear  that  no  one  could  say  which  passage  w^as  the 
earlier.  And  we  can  scarcely  be  wrong  in  inferring 
that  even  at  this  early  period  of  Islamic  jurisprudence 
it  was  acknowledged  that  on  many  subjects  the 
revealed  law  was  inconsistent. 

The  confession  that  parts  of  the  most  precise  legis- 
lation in  the  Koran  had  been  abrogated  by  other 
parts  must  have  been  a  trying  admission  to  make, 
but  there  was  no  way  of  avoiding  it.  In  Surah  ii. 
176  the  dying  Moslem  is  enjoined  to  bequeath  his 
property  to  his  parents  and  near  relatives.  In  Surah 
iv.  certain  fixed  portions  are  assigned  by  the  law  to 
these  relatives ;  clearly  the  property  cannot  both  be 
bequeathed  and  divided  by  the  state.  But  perhaps  he 
has  the  right  to  bequeath  the  whole  ?     The  tradition 


78     EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

is  here  cited  that  according  to  the  Prophet  the  right 
of  legacy  is  restricted  to  one-third.  Or  perhaps  the 
text  of  Surah  ii.  may  be  still  valid,  as  meaning  that 
legacies  may  be  made  only  to  relations.  Here  we 
have  an  ingenious  argument  based  on  a  story  that 
some  Moslem  whose  whole  property  consisted  of  six 
slaves  manumitted  them  by  will.  The  Prophet 
cancelled  this  arrangement,  and  manumitted  two  by 
lot ;  the  rest  were  to  be  assigned  in  accordance  with 
the  law  of  Surah  iv.  But  since  the  Prophet  permitted 
the  legacy  of  one-third  of  the  estate  and  the  bene- 
ficiaries were  the  legatee's  slaves,  and  no  Arab  has  a 
kinsman  for  his  slave,  it  follows  that  the  restriction  of 
legacies  to  kinsmen  has  no  existence.  There  is  there- 
fore nothing  for  it  but  to  declare  the  text  of  Surah  ii. 
abrogated  by  that  of  Surah  iv. 

The  question  of  the  treatment  of  adulteresses  is 
even  more  serious.  In  Surah  iv.,  which  is  called  the 
Surah  of  Women,  and  contains  a  great  deal  of  precise 
legislation,  the  punishment  assigned  is  imprisonment 
for  life.  In  Surah  xxiv.,  of  which  the  date  can  be 
accurately  fixed,  since  it  deals  with  the  affair  of 
*A'ishah,  which  again  is  connected  with  a  particular 
campaign,  the  punishment  assigned  is  a  hundred 
stripes.  But  the  tradition  is  that  the  Prophet 
administered  the  stripes  to  the  adulterer,  ordered 
him  to  be  banished  for  a  year,  and  ordered  the 
adulteress  to  be  stoned.  If,  then,  the  last  was  the 
practice  to  be  followed,  not  only  was  one  text  of  the 
Koran  abrogated  by  another,  but  both  were  abrogated 
by  practice.     Some  attempt  might  indeed  be  made 


THE   LEGAL   SUPPLEMENT  79 

to  accommodate  the  second  text  and  the  practice  to 
differing  conditions,  but  the  text  of  the  Surah  of 
Women  had  clearly  to  be  disregarded.  What  is 
probably  the  case  is,  that  the  Prophet's  treatment  of 
the  offence  grew  less  instead  of  more  barbarous,  and 
that  his  final  views  were  represented  by  Surah  iv.  ; 
but  the  practice  of  exacting  the  worst  penalty  was  too 
deeply  sanctioned  by  custom  to  be  overridden  even 
by  Koranic  texts.  The  affair  of  'A'ishah  had  become 
so  famous  that  the  slandering  of  women  was  regarded 
as  a  deadly  sin,  which  even  the  earliest  Islamic  creed 
was  said  to  have  especially  prohibited,  and  the  evidence 
on  which  a  charge  of  adultery  could  be  established 
was  practically  of  a  kind  which  could  never  be 
produced. 

The  inherent  weaknesses  of  this  second  source  of  law 
are,  of  course,  two.  In  the  first  place,  we  look  in  vain 
for  evidence  that  exhaustive  records  of  the  Prophet's 
sayings  and  doings  were  kept.  Shafi'i  himself  accounts 
for  differences  of  opinion  between  the  "  learned  "  on 
the  ground  that  some  tradition  may  have  escaped 
them  ;  had  they  known  more,  they  would  have  been 
guided  by  that  superior  knowledge.^  In  the  second 
place,  the  memories  of  those  who  transmitted  tradi- 
tions were  weak,  and  the  author  of  the  code  himself 
repeatedly  confesses  that  he  has  forgotten  the  name 
of  some  intermediary  or  other ;  ^  and  at  times  that 
he  has  forgotten  the  exact  words,  though  he  believes 
that  he  has  reproduced  the  sense  correctly.^  The 
jurists  of  the  preceding  generations  could  not  rely  on 

1  Umm  iv.  171.  ^  Hjid,^  vi.  3  ;  cf.  iv.  71.  »  yj,  172^ 


80     EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

their  memories  with  any  greater  certainty ;  Sufyan 
Thauri  forgot  the  name  of  an  intermediary  on  whose 
authority  a  tradition  was  quoted  ;  one  of  his  class 
reminded  him,  but  this  was  apparently  not  quite 
satisfactory.^  The  possibility  of  error  and  ignorance 
is  allowed  in  the  case  of  contemporaries  of  the 
Prophet."  And,  indeed,  Shafi'i  is  said  to  have  made 
a  general  confession  that  there  was  no  one  whom  the 
practice  of  the  Prophet  did  not  escape,^  though  he 
assumes  that  somewhere  in  the  Moslem  world  this 
knowledge  is  preserved.*  Hence  when  the  second 
source  of  law  is  considered,  there  is  generally  the 
double  doubt  whether  there  was  any  precedent  or 
maxim  really  going  back  to  the  Prophet,  and  if  there 
was,  whether  it  was  his  final  opinion  on  the  subject. 
And  the  omission  of  a  name  in  the  chain  of  authorities 
naturally  invalidates  the  whole. 

Further,  in  the  case  of  the  Prophet's  practice  there 
was  the  same  difficulty  as  was  found  in  the  Koran, 
viz.  that  his  rulings  varied  from  time  to  time,  and 
chronology  had  to  decide  which  ruling  was  to  be 
followed.  Sometimes,  indeed,  the  chronology  gave  a 
satisfactory  solution.  Thus  on  the  question  of  the 
attitude  to  be  adopted  in  prayer,  whether  if  the  leader 
be  prevented  by  infirmity  from  standing  upright  the 
followers  also  should  refrain  from  standing,  there  were 
reports  of  two  occasions  on  which  the  Prophet  set 
precedents ;  one  of  these  happened  to  be  on  the 
occasion  of  the  Prophet's   last   illness :    clearly  this 

1  Umm  vii.  41.  ^  iJjid^^  yi.  l63. 

3  Yakut  vi.  387.  ^  Umm  vii.  9,65. 


THE   LEGAL  SUPPLEMENT  81 

had  to  be  followed,  since  there  could  not  have  been  a 
later  occasion. 

Besides  this,  there  was  at  times  conflict  between  the 
Prophet's  maxims  and  his  ascertained  practice ;  on 
such  occasions  Shafi'i  apparently  holds  that  the  maxim 
is  to  be  followed.  A  serious  case  in  which  he  is  con- 
fronted with  this  difficulty  is  that  of  murder  by  a 
Moslem  of  a  Jew  or  Christian  :  the  historical  evidence 
appeared  to  show  that  the  Prophet  and  some  of  his 
successors  ordered  the  same  treatment  as  would  have 
been  adopted  if  the  Christian  had  been  the  murderer  ; 
the  latter  was  handed  over  to  the  relatives  of  the 
murdered  man,  to  kill,  forgive,  or  compel  to  pay 
blood-money  as  they  chose ;  and,  indeed,  where  the 
relatives  of  the  murdered  man  expressed  their  desire 
to  forgive  the  offence,  the  Caliph  took  pains  to  see 
that  this  was  not  due  to  intimidation.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  Prophet  was  credited  with  the  maxim, 
"  Believer  shall  not  be  slain  for  Unbeliever,"  delivered 
on  a  variety  of  occasions.  The  jurist,  then,  adopts  this 
maxim  as  regulating  procedure,  and  has  to  reject  the 
historical  traditions  as  weak,  or  suppose  that  the 
Prophet's  successors  were  mistaken.^  And  in  other 
cases  where  the  decisions  ascribed  to  the  foremost  of 
the  Prophet's  Companions  differ  from  the  Prophet's 
practice  or  from  his  maxims,  it  is  agreed  that  the 
former  are  not  deserving  of  consideration.  Where 
there  is  a  known  ruling  of  the  Prophet,  no  one  else 
has  anything  to  say.  Useful  as  this  maxim  is,  it  has 
the  difficulty  that  these  same  persons  are  also  the 

1  Cf.  Tabarl  ii.  83. 


82    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF   MOHAMMEDANISM 

most  trustworthy  witnesses  of  what  the  Prophet  said 
or  did ;  and  their  falhbihty  to  a  certain  extent  dis- 
credits the  whole  system  of  legislating  by  the  Prophet's 
precedents. 

Occasionally  it  is  in  our  power  to  show  that  the 
traditions  which  form  the  basis  of  the  codes  are  legal 
fictions.  The  historian  Tabari  tells  us  the  practice  of 
obtaining  redress  for  murders  by  unknown  persons 
by  administering  oaths  wholesale  was  an  innovation 
of  the  year  30 — a  score  of  years  after  the  Prophet's 
death  ;  ^  the  jurist  Shafi'i  bases  it  on  an  anecdote  of  the 
Prophet's  procedure,  which  indeed  is  on  other  grounds 
clearly  apocryphal.^  The  practice  of  administering 
stripes  for  wine-drinking  is  said  by  the  historian  to  have 
been  introduced  by  general  consent  in  the  time  of  the 
third  Caliph  ;^  the  jurist  also  finds  a  precedent  in  the 
Prophet's  practice.  And  in  general  the  history  of 
the  jurists  differs  widely  from  that  of  the  historians. 
European  critics  are  inclined  to  attach  more  weight  to 
the  statements  of  the  historians.  It  is  painful  to  find 
one  of  the  founders  of  the  science  of  law  confessing  that 
he  had  pleaded  the  genuineness  of  a  document  which 
he  secretly  suspected  of  being  a  forgery,  and  therefore 
declined  actually  to  attest ;  the  result,  which  was  the 
serious  one  of  inducing  a  man  of  ability  and  influence 
to  join  the  party  of  the  unscrupulous  adventurer 
Mukhtar,  being  equally  attained.  In  any  other  case, 
then,  this  person's  inclinations  may  have  caused  him 
to  play  fast  and  loose  with  his  critical  conscience.* 

1  Tabari  i.  2842.  2  Umm  vi.  78. 

3  Tabari  i.  3028.  ""  Sha'bi. 


THE   LEGAL  SUPPLEMENT  83 

That  the  whole  system  of  the  Oral  Law  did  not 
escape  ridicule  in  certain  quarters  is  natural.  There 
were  the  objections  to  which  allusion  has  been  made, 
the  fact  that  the  traditionalists  themselves  confessed 
to  lapses  of  memory,  so  that  one  of  these  persons  is 
represented  as  quoting  someone  else  for  an  assertion 
which  he  himself  had  made :  "  I  was  told  by  Munkidh, 
who  heard  it  from  me,  who  heard  it  from  Ayyub  "  ;  ^ 
and  the  fact  that  there  were  contradictory  traditions 
dealing  with  the  same  matters.  Then  the  content  of 
many  traditions  was  clearly  fabulous  and  calculated  to 
bring  the  system  into  ridicule,  e.g.  that  the  Prophet 
said  the  thickness  of  an  Unbeliever's  skin  in  hell  will 
be  forty  divine  cubits,  or  that  the  wind  is  not  to  be 
abused  because  it  is  the  breath  of  God.  Further, 
the  traditionalists  were  taunted  with  being  ignorant 
and  often  unable  to  compose  correct  Arabic.  It 
could  be  replied  that  a  man  might  be  a  good  tradi- 
tionalist without  being  a  good  grammarian  ;  that  the 
collecting  of  traditions  of  various  degrees  of  proba- 
bility was  for  the  purpose  of  criticising  them  and 
selecting  those  of  which  the  genuineness  stood 
proper  tests ;  and  the  charge  of  stupidity  could  also 
be  rebutted.  The  fact,  however,  was  that  this 
collecting  of  traditions  had  been  the  result  of  the 
needs  felt  by  the  community,  and  it  would  seem  that 
those  who  ostensibly  rejected  the  process  were  con- 
tent to  profit  by  the  results.  Hence  the  similarity 
between  the  codes  compiled  by  the  different  sects 
of  Islam   shows   that   the   basic   traditions   were  in 

1  Mukhtalif  al-Hadith  92. 


84    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

reality  recognised  though  there  might  be  reasons  for 
professedly  ascribing  the  laws  to  a  different  origin, 
e.g.  the  esoteric  knowledge  communicated  by  the 
Prophet  to  members  of  his  family. 

What  must  be  said  of  the  jurists  and  traditionalists 
is,  that  whatever  the  value  of  their  second  source  of 
law,  they  spared  no  pains  in  endeavouring  to  recover 
it.  In  order  to  find  out  the  true  amount  of  the 
jizyah  or  tribute  exacted  from  Jews  and  Christians 
in  the  Yemen  under  the  Prophet's  regulation,  Shafi'i 
travelled  over  the  whole  of  that  country  and  asked 
for  information  in  every  province.^  In  order  to  dis- 
cover the  true  theory  of  pious  benefactions,  he  con- 
sulted many  of  the  descendants  of  the  Refugees  and 
Helpers  in  the  sacred  cities.'^  He  consulted  more  than 
one  member  of  the  family  of  Omar  and  of  the  family 
of  Ali  about  practice.^  What  he  did  in  his  time  was 
doubtless  done  by  others  before  his  time,  and  it  is 
partly  due  to  the  rise  of  this  source  of  law  that 
posterity  knows  so  much  about  the  Companions  of 
the  Prophet,  each  one  of  whom  was  a  sort  of  oracle. 

In  order  to  compile  a  code  of  law  on  so  strange  a 
foundation  as  casual  observation  of  what  one  man 
had  said  or  done,  research  had  indeed  to  be  indefatig- 
ably  carried  on ;  and  since  it  was  impossible  to  leave 
questions  unanswered,  much  had  to  be  accepted  on 
very  imperfect  attestation.  Shafi'i  has  a  paragraph 
in  which  he  compares  the  evidence  required  for 
legislation  with  that  required  in  a  law  court,  and  he 
admits  that  the  latter  is  stricter  in  many  particulars. 

1  Umm  iv.  101.  2  HjU    iii.  276.  ^  /^j-^.,  iii.  281. 


THE   LEGAL   SUPPLEMENT  85 

For  a  tradition  he  is  satisfied  with  the  evidence  of 
one  man  or  one  woman :  in  court  he  requires  more. 
He  will  take  hearsay  evidence  for  a  tradition,  if  the 
reporter  is  of  good  character  ;  but  in  court  he  re- 
quires firsthand  knowledge.  In  the  case  of  conflict- 
ing traditions  he  will  accept  one,  using  as  criterion 
its  agreement  with  some  other  source  of  law :  but 
he  cannot  deal  in  the  same  way  with  conflicting 
affidavits.  On  the  other  hand,  he  claims  to  demand 
in  the  reporter  of  a  tradition  a  higher  degree  of 
intelligence  than  he  would  demand  from  a  witness, 
because  it  is  sufficient  in  the  case  of  a  tradition  if  the 
sense  be  retained  though  the  words  may  be  altered  ; 
but  it  requires  a  certain  degree  of  intelligence  to 
know  when  an  alteration  in  the  diction  will  not 
affect  the  sense.  Whereas,  then,  in  court  he  is  pre- 
pared to  assume  that  credible  witnesses  guarantee 
the  credibility  of  their  authorities,  in  the  case  of 
traditions  he  does  not  take  this  for  granted,  but  has 
to  institute  an  inquiry  into  each  link  of  the  chain. 

Shafi'i's  argument  for  receiving  a  single  attestation 
in  the  case  of  a  tradition,  whereas  the  law  courts  are 
not  satisfied  with  less  than  a  double  attestation,  is 
highly  ingenious.  One  of  his  points  is  that  in  the 
case  of  a  tradition  the  attitude  of  the  reporter  is 
purely  objective  ;  he  cannot  be  suspected  of  partisan- 
ship in  matters  which  affect  all  Moslems  alike.  It 
was,  however,  clear  that  the  whole  theory  of  tradi- 
tional law  must  break  down  if  a  single  attestation 
was  excluded.  For,  in  numerous  cases,  the  rulings 
of  the  Prophet  were  supposed  to  take,  or  actually  did 


86    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

take,  the  form  of  messages  communicated  through  a 
messenger  or  dehvered  to  an  individual.  Many  a 
piece  of  information  about  his  conduct  was  communi- 
cated to  the  world  by  one  of  his  wives.  And,  indeed, 
the  biography  of  the  Prophet  offered  numerous 
occasions  on  which  matters  of  the  highest  importance 
had  been  communicated  in  this  way.  When  the 
congregation  was  praying  at  Kuba,  a  messenger 
arrived  from  the  Prophet  telling  them  that  in  accord- 
ance with  a  revelation  which  has  just  descended,  they 
are  to  reverse  the  direction  of  prayer ;  the  attestation 
of  a  single  messenger  satisfies  them,  and  they  reverse 
the  direction  in  consequence.  The  command  to  spill 
all  spirituous  liquors  was  communicated  by  single 
messengers  and  was  immediately  obeyed.  Indeed, 
on  certain  occasions,  when  it  would  have  been  easy 
for  the  Prophet  to  have  sent  a  number  of  messengers 
at  once,  he  was  satisfied  with  sending  one  and  un- 
questionably expected  that  the  message  would  be 
obeyed. 

Shafi'i  further  points  out  that  the  individuals  sent 
with  messages  were  persons  who  were  known  to  the 
individuals  or  communities  to  whom  the  missives 
were  directed,  and  who  therefore  were  in  a  position 
analogous  to  that  of  reporters  of  traditions  to  Moslem 
communities  of  a  later  age. 

Any  precedent,  however  authoritative  the  person 
responsible  for  it,  had  to  give  way  before  a  tradition 
of  the  Prophet.  Where  a  tradition  could  be  cited, 
the  common  sense  of  the  individual  judge  had  to 
give   way.      One   saintly   follower   of  the    Prophet, 


THE   LEGAL   SUPPLEMENT  87 

Abu'l-Darda,  declared  he  could  not  live  in  a  country 
where  the  sovereign  set  his  own  opinion  against  the 
practice  of  the  Prophet ;  the  question  being  whether 
an  object  made  of  a  precious  metal  might  be  sold  for 
more  than  its  intrinsic  value.  Common  sense  would 
seem  to  be  in  favour  of  the  workmanship,  etc.,  being 
assigned  some  value,  but  the  Prophet's  dictum  was 
against  it.  In  discussing  the  credibility  of  witnesses, 
Shafi'i  is  satisfied  that  no  Jew  or  Christian  is  a  credible 
witness ;  his  sole  argument  is  that  the  Koran  charges 
these  sects  with  corrupting  the  text  of  their  sacred 
books ;  into  the  justice  of  that  charge  it  is  not  his 
business  to  inquire,  neither  does  he  consider  whether, 
if  it  be  true,  it  falls  on  all  existing  members  of  those 
communities,  or  whether  the  culprits  were  persons  in  a 
bygone  age,  whose  work  it  is  not  now  possible  to  undo. 
He  does  not  even  take  notice  of  the  fact  that  the 
Koran  itself  distinguishes  between  different  members 
of  those  communities,  allowing  that  there  are  honest 
as  well  as  dishonest  persons  among  them.  And,  as 
will  be  seen,  he  has  some  real  difficulties  to  face,  but 
a  little  experience  might  have  shown  him  that  if  it 
was  the  desire  of  the  judges  to  arrive  at  the  truth,  this 
ruling  of  his  barred  and  bolted  many  of  the  avenues. 

One  principle  which  is  too  deeply  ingrained  in 
these  works  ever  to  be  forgotten  is  that  only  oral 
tradition  counts  ;  written  documents  must  be  cited 
from  memory,  not  from  the  text.  Traditions  are  to 
be  condemned  merely  on  the  ground  that  they  are 
taken  from  documents;^  and  as  we  have  seen,  ''the 

1  Mukhtalifal-HadIth9S. 


88     EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

Veracious  Scroll,"  said  to  be  in  the  possession  of  a 
Companion,  was  rated  very  low.  A  man  who  procures 
an  old  letter  learns  it  by  heart,  so  as  not  to  forget  it, 
he  does  not  apparently  copy  \t}  Letters  of  early 
Caliphs  or  other  persons  of  importance  are  then 
regularly  cited  in  this  way;  and  when  Shafi'i  cites 
a  deed  of  gift  by  Ali  to  some  tribe,  he  cites  it  as  he 
heard  it  read  out  to  him  by  the  Governor  of  INIedinah, 
not  as  he  read  it.^  Hence  no  attempt  appears  to  have 
been  made  to  secure  the  preservation  of  the  originals 
of  these  valuable  documents,  about  which  the  hand- 
writing expert  might  perhaps  occasionally  have  had 
something  to  say.  The  only  theory  which  explains  this 
strange  delusion  appears  to  be  that  the  Koran  tolerated 
no  literature  besides  itself.  Somewhat  similarly  the 
supposed  Letter  of  the  Christian  Saviour  to  Abgar, 
King  of  Edessa,  which  is  cited  in  letter- form  by 
Eusebius,  is  given  as  oral  tradition  in  the  Syriac 
account,  which  is  not  much  later,  for  fear  that  this 
letter  should  demand  admission  into  the  Gospel ;  and, 
as  we  have  seen,  a  place  in  the  Koran  seems  to  have 
been  claimed  for  the  tariff  of  alms,  which  was  con- 
tained in  a  letter  of  the  Prophet.  And  since  the 
Prophet's  letters  had  been  drawn  up  by  his  scribes, 
there  might  have  been  some  difficulty  about  stopping 
this  source  of  additions  to  the  Koran  if  the  perpetua- 
tion of  any  collection  of  letters  had  been  tolerated. 

Hence  we  read  of  a  practice  whereby  people  took 
down  traditions,  learned   them  by  heart,  and  then 

1  Tabarl  ii.  502,  3. 

2  Umm  iii.  279;  letters  cited^  vi.  125;  vii.  135,  291,  293. 


THE   LEGAL   SUPPLEMENT  89 

discarded  what  they  had  written.  The  cases  wherein 
a  permanent  record  was  preserved  somewhere  seem 
isolated ;  there  is  an  interesting  story  that  a  copy  of 
the  poems  composed  by  the  Prophet's  court-poet, 
Hassan  Ibn  Thabit,  was  preserved  in  Medinah,  and 
regularly  renewed  when  the  writing  showed  signs  of 
evanescing  ;  but  written  bodies  of  tradition  appear  to 
be  mentioned  only  after  the  founding  of  Baghdad. 
The  vast  journeys  taken  by  traditionalists  were  there- 
fore futile,  since  they  only  collected  matter  which 
might  easily  have  been  communicated  by  one  man  or 
learned  from  books;  for,  from  the  very  formulae 
wherewith  the  traditions  are  introduced,  it  is  evident 
that  the  teachers  claim  to  be  nothing  more  than 
intermediaries ;  if  what  they  communicated  was 
original,  it  was  false.  They  were  not  like  the  teachers 
of  the  true  pronunciation  or  even  the  true  interpreta- 
tion of  the  Koran,  who  might  well  have  matter  to 
communicate  which  was  either  their  own  property 
or  else  only  communicable  orally.  One  dated  copy 
of  a  collection  of  traditions,  guarded  like  the  poems 
of  Hassan  at  Medinah,  would  have  been  better 
evidence  of  authenticity  that  any  number  of  "paths." 
We  can  only  then  suppose  that  the  fear  lest  the 
Koran  might  be  superseded  was  what  delayed  the 
process  of  committing  this  matter  permanently  to 
parchment  or  papyrus ;  and  when  at  last  that  step 
had  been  taken,  the  notion  that  no  written  copy  was 
authoritative  had  become  too  firmly  implanted  to  be 
uprooted.  It  must,  however,  be  added  that  the 
forgery  of  letters  appears  to  have  been  exceedingly 


90    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

common,^  and  the  repeated  exposure  of  such  fabrica- 
tions may  have  brought  the  written  word  into 
discredit. 

Just  as  we  find  misquotations  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment and  the  Jewish  tradition,  one  name  being  sub- 
stituted for  another,  or  non-Bibhcal  matter  being  called 
Biblical,  so  the  Koran  was  occasionally  misquoted,  as, 
e.g.,  by  Mansur  in  his  letter  to  the  Alid  pretender,  or 
even  some  secular  author  confused  with  the  divine 
author  to  whom  that  work  was  ascribed.  The 
human  memory  is  everywhere  untrustworthy  ;  only, 
such  occasional  misquotation  hurts  no  one  when 
there  is  a  text  whereby  it  can  be  remedied.  In  the 
case  of  the  Tradition  there  was  no  check,  and  if 
even  a  professional  student  of  tradition  like  Shafi'i 
frequently  confesses  that  his  memory  is  at  a  loss, 
we  need  have  no  confidence  that  the  memory  of  any 
other  reporter  was  better.  Sometimes  the  ascription 
of  a  saying  could  be  put  right ;  Abu  Talib  points 
out  that  one  which  was  ordinarily  ascribed  to  the 
Prophet  really  belonged  to  the  Sufi  Sahl  al-Tustari 
of  the  third  century.  Some  of  the  Prophet's  sayings 
were  referred  to  earlier  revelations,  and  can  indeed 
be  identified  in  the  Bible  or  Apocrypha.  The 
principle  of  jurisprudence  whereby  in  civil  suits  the 
plaintiff  must  produce  evidence,  whereas  all  that  can 
be  demanded  of  the  defendant  is  an  oath,  is  some- 
times referred  to  Omar,  at  other  times  to  the 
Prophet,  whereas  it  really  comes  from  the  Jewish 
Mishnah.     The  study,  therefore,  of  the  development 

1  Tabarlii.  1312,  1870,  1882,  etc. 


THE   LEGAL   SUPPLEMENT  91 

of  jurisprudence  is  exceedingly  complicated  ;  for  the 
maxims  ascribed  to  the  Prophet  seem  in  numerous 
cases  to  be  little  more  than  a  summary  of  existing 
practice,  and  yet  there  is  no  doubt  that  these  maxims 
when  formulated  and  so  ascribed  had  a  great  effect 
on  subsequent  legislation. 

Still,  codification  of  the  accumulated  mass  of 
practice  must  at  an  early  period  have  become  a 
crying  need  ;  and  unofficial  codes  are  likely  to  have 
been  compiled  and  even  issued  before  any  received 
the  sanction  of  the  central  authority.  As  early  as 
the  year  128  we  read  of  an  official  appointing  a 
committee  of  pious  men  to  make  a  collection  of 
sunan  or  approved  practices  and  siyai^  rules  of  conduct, 
which  were  then  to  be  written  out  by  his  scribe.^ 
Afterwards  a  document  called  the  sirali  of  Ibn 
Suraij,  or  "line  of  conduct,"  was  actually  circulated.'^ 
Before  this  time  the  building  up  of  a  system  of 
jurisprudence  had  been  facilitated  by  the  classification 
of  subjects,  under  which  precedents  and  maxims 
could  be  collected  ;  this  appears  to  have  been  done 
during  the  first  century  in  Medinah,  where  the  study 
of  Islamic  law  started,  and  where  the  author  of  the 
code  which  dominates  in  the  Maghrib  passed  his  life. 
As  in  other  cases,  seven  names  during  this  period 
became  classical  in  connection  with  the  study,  though 
not  all  agreed  about  the  names  to  be  placed  in 
the  list. 

The  studies  of  the  Medinese  jurists  of  the  first 
century    are    no    longer    in    existence ;    the    great 

1  Tabariii.  19I8.  2  /^^-^^^  iggj 


92    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

Pandects  which  were  compiled  by  the  doctors  of  the 
second  century  assume  the  work  of  their  predecessors 
and  are  based  upon  them.  It  is  fortunate  for  those 
who  are  interested  in  the  historical  development  of 
Moslem  law  that  the  works  of  several  of  the  founders 
of  law-schools  are  still  extant.  In  that  of  Shafi'i  we 
find  that  the  study  has  not  yet  quite  emerged  from 
the  controversial  and  dialogue  form.  Shafi'i  records 
the  discussions  in  which  he  took  the  leading  part,  the 
arguments  adduced  by  his  opponents  as  well  as  his 
own,  and  so  takes  the  reader  into  his  workshop.  We 
learn  from  these  discussions  that  the  collection  and 
criticism  of  tradition  had  already  been  highly 
developed  ;  the  disputants  are  already  familiar  with 
the  traditions  quoted  under  each  heading,  and  with 
the  chief  inferences  drawn  from  them  ;  some  canons 
for  ranging  the  traditions  in  order  of  credibility  have 
already  been  formulated,  and  the  great  principle  that 
the  sole  source  of  law  is  the  Prophet  in  one  capacity 
or  another  is  acknowledged.  When  Shafi'i  challenges 
his  opponent  to  reject  the  principle,  the  audience 
permit  no  dispute  on  the  point.  But  further,  we 
find  that  grammatical  and  lexicographical  studies  of 
which  the  purpose  is  fixing  the  meaning  of  the 
Prophet's  utterances  have  already  gone  a  long  way. 
And  still  more  we  are  struck  with  the  subtlety  of 
the  disputants,  and  their  skill  in  constructing 
imaginary  cases.  Probably  it  is  less  subtle  than  the 
discussions  recorded  in  the  Jewish  Gemara,  but  it 
has  the  merit  of  being  far  more  practical  and  generally 
intelligible. 


THE   LEGAL  SUPPLEMENT  93 

It  was  in  the  course  of  these  discussions,  then,  that 
the  systems  of  law  got  built  up.  The  audience 
decide  which  of  the  disputants  has  the  better  of  the 
argument ;  and  the  anxiety  of  each  to  defend  his 
position  leads  to  the  enucleation  of  various  principles, 
and  in  general  the  fixing  of  the  Sunnah,  and  some 
sort  of  rating  of  the  traditionalists  at  various  values. 
No  amount  of  acuteness,  however,  can  compensate 
for  the  fundamental  weakness  of  the  system  :  the 
possibility  that  any  text  of  the  Koran  may  have 
been  abrogated,  and  the  liability  of  any  tradition  to 
be  questioned.  Most  of  the  discussions  illustrate 
this.  We  may  refer  again  to  the  question  whether 
the  murder  of  a  Jew  or  Christian  by  a  Moslem  is 
punishable  with  death ;  the  Koran  throws  little  light 
on  this  matter,  except  that  it  quotes  as  a  precept 
given  to  Moses  the  maxim  "  a  life  for  a  life."  Only 
it  does  not  follow  that  this  precept  was  to  be  taken 
on  by  the  new  religion  :  it  may  have  been  abrogated 
by  it  as  many  other  ordinances  were  abrogated. 
Then  we  come  to  the  practice  of  the  Prophet :  one 
tradition  is  to  the  effect  that  one  'Amr  Ibn  Umayyah 
was  killed  by  the  Prophet  for  a  murder  of  this 
kind  ;  but  to  this  there  is  the  reply  that  this  could 
not  have  been,  since  'Amr  Ibn  Umayyah  survived 
the  Prophet.  The  conduct  of  the  Prophet's 
Companions  in  similar  cases  was  no  less  ambiguous  : 
Omar  wrote  that  the  murderer  should  be  executed, 
and  then  wrote  to  countermand  the  order.  Othman 
ordered  an  execution,  but  was  dissuaded  by  his 
colleagues.     No   less   difference    prevails   as   to   the 


94     EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

amount  of  the  blood-money  due.  Either  it  is  the 
same  as  due  for  a  JNIoslem,  or  it  is  half,  or  it  is  about 
a  third. 

In  spite,  therefore,  of  the  keenest  desire  on  these 
persons'  part  to  abide  by  the  Scripture  and  the 
Tradition  to  the  exclusion  of  their  private  predilec- 
tions, they  had  after  all  to  be  guided  by  the  latter  ; 
those  who  wished  to  uphold  the  privileges  of  Islam 
took  one  line,  those  who  thought  rather  of  the 
welfare  of  the  whole  community  took  another.  The 
leading  jurists  even  employ  the  formula  "  I  like," 
**  I  dislike,"  thereby  implying  that  they  are  settling 
things  according  to  their  predilections :  though 
doubtless  these  were  what  they  supposed  to  be  most 
agreeable  to  the  system  of  the  Koran.  In  the 
3Iudaivwanat  ascribed  to  Malik  in  ordinary  cases  the 
reporter  merely  gives  the  question  which  he  had 
addressed  to  the  hearer  of  Malik  as  to  Malik's 
handling  of  some  question,  and  then  reports  the 
answer  :  which  at  times  is  to  the  effect  that  Malik  was 
not  known  to  have  expressed  an  opinion  on  it :  but 
more  often  is  an  actual  opinion  without  quotation  of 
the  arguments  whereby  Malik  would  have  defended 
it.  Hence  the  charge  made  against  the  Jews  in  the 
Koran  of  having  taken  their  Rabbis  as  gods  in 
addition  to  God,  in  the  sense  that  they  assigned  the 
Rabbinical  legislation  a  value  not  second  to  that  of 
the  Scripture,  might  towards  the  end  of  the  second 
century  have  been  brought  against  the  Moslems  also  : 
the  words  of  the  great  jurists  became  a  source  of  law, 
whereas  legislation  was  a  privilege  of  God  Almighty. 


THE   LEGAL   SUPPLEMENT  95 

Having  adopted  this  curious  source  of  law,  Shafi'i 
proceeds  to  deduce  principles  with  great  acuteness. 
The  Prophet  is  supposed  to  have  acknowledged  that 
when  cases  were  pleaded  before  him  it  was  possible 
that  one  of  the  litigants  might  be  a  better  pleader 
than  the  other,  and  he,  the  Prophet,  might  in  con- 
sequence give  an  erroneous  verdict :  but  he  warned 
such  pleaders  that  anything  which  was  in  consequence 
wrongly  assigned  them  was  a  strip  of  Hell  Fire,  whence 
they  had  best  not  avail  themselves  thereof.  From 
this  tradition  a  whole  series  of  inferences  are  drawn. 
One  is  that  it  is  the  duty  of  the  judge  to  follow  the 
evidence  without  endeavouring  to  go  beyond  it ; 
another,  that  the  judge's  ruling  does  not  alter  the 
rights  and  wrongs  of  the  case ;  a  third,  that  it  is 
lawful  for  a  citizen  to  set  aside  the  ruling  of  a  judge 
when  it  is  in  his  favour ;  a  fourth,  that  the  divine 
vengeance  is  threatened  to  those  who  take  moneys 
assigned  to  them  from  the  public  treasury  which  are 
not  their  due. 

The  second  of  these  inferences  is  of  some  import- 
ance, as  it  precludes  the  employment  of  precedents, 
except  where  they  are  taken  from  the  practice  of 
saints  of  the  first  order.  Shafi'i  indeed  distinguishes 
two  cases :  one  in  which  a  sentence  is  found  after- 
wards to  contradict  either  Scripture  or  Tradition ;  in 
such  a  case  a  succeeding  judge  has  the  right  to 
reverse  it.  Another  is  the  case  in  which  there  is 
no  question  of  Scripture  or  Tradition,  but  only  of 
analogy,  in  which  different  opinions  might  reasonably 
be  held.      Supposing  that  after  taking  one  view  a 


96     EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

judge  changes  his  mind,  he  is  not  to  reverse  his 
decision  nor  should  a  succeeding  judge  reverse  it, 
though  in  future  cases  he  might  follow  the  view 
which  had  finally  commended  itself. 

The  view  of  Omar  in  a  letter  of  instructions,  which 
is  probably  apocryphal,  was  that  any  judgment  might 
be  rescinded  when  the  judge  discovered  that  there 
was  a  preferable  opinion  to  that  which  he  had  at  first 
adopted. 

If  one  compares  the  volumes  of  Shafi'i  and  JNIalik 
with  the  Mishnah  and  Gemara,  the  comparison  is 
favourable  to  the  Moslem  jurists  from  several  points 
of  view.  First  of  these  is  the  speed  with  which  the 
science  of  jurisprudence  was  evolved ;  two  centuries 
had  not  elapsed  from  the  Migration  before  the 
Moslems  had  a  system  based  on  principles,  which,  if 
doubtfully  wise,  at  any  rate  are  as  wise  as  those 
followed  by  the  Jewish  lawyers.  And  if  there  be 
any  merit  in  excogitating  questions  of  casuistry,  the 
Moslem  can  conceive  situations  as  unlikely  to  arise  as 
any  imagined  by  the  Jew.  Shafi'i  describes  the  case 
of  a  Moslem  aiming  at  a  Christian  and  the  latter 
being  converted  before  the  arrow  hits  him,  or  of  a 
slave  being  manumitted  in  the  interval  that  elapses 
between  the  direction  of  the  arrow  and  its  piercing 
the  victim.^  It  does  not  seem  that  the  Moslems  ever 
made  the  mistake  of  thinking  jurisprudence  easy, 
and  supposing  that  lawyers  quibbled  out  of  pure 
malignity ;  the  Moslem  authors  certainly  did  not 
aspire  to  rise  above  their   source,  the   Prophet,  but 

1  Umm  vi.  33  end. 


THE   LEGAL   SUPPLEMENT  97 

they  took  endless  pains  to  ascertain  what  views  he 
had  held,  and  to  work  these  out  to  their  proper 
consequences.  Although  not  many  Greek  books  can 
have  been  rendered  into  Arabic  before  the  end  of  the 
second  century,  Shafi'i  displays  some  acquaintance 
with  the  Aristotelian  logic,  and  is  clear  about  the 
meaning  of  the  words  "genus "and  "species."  His 
arguments  from  analogy  are  also  highly  ingenious. 
The  Prophet  forbade  the  keeping  of  dogs,  except  for 
certain  necessary  purposes ;  hence  Shafi'i  argues  that 
there  is  no  property  in  dogs,  and  that  if  a  man  kill  a 
dog  his  owner  has  no  right  to  compensation.  Why 
not,  asks  the  opponent,  if  the  dog  be  kept  for  one  of 
these  useful  purposes  ?  The  reply  is  that  the  licence 
is  limited  to  the  owner ;  the  case  which  may  be 
compared  is  that  of  carrion  which  under  necessity 
may  be  eaten ;  it  is  clear,  however,  that  no  one  who 
burned  such  carrion  would  be  liable  to  pay  damages : 
and  the  case  of  the  dog  is  comparable  to  that  of  the 
carrion,  as  being  permanently  in  a  state  of  prohibi- 
tion, from  which  it  can  be  temporarily  exempted,  but 
which  does  not  become  property  thereby. 

A  study  of  the  great  Pandects  on  which  the 
Malikite  and  Shafi'ite  systems  are  based  suggests 
that  any  influence  which  earlier  systems  of  juris- 
prudence may  have  exercised  on  those  of  Islam  must 
be  looked  for  at  the  commencement,  and  no  later. 
Some  few  technical  terms  appear  to  be  borrowed 
from  Ciiristian  or  Jewish  systems,  but  the  bulk  of 
the  development  is  independent,  and  the  possibility 
of  foreign  ideas  being  adopted  seems  to  be  excluded. 


98     EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

The  whole  is  dominated  by  the  rough-and-ready 
nature  of  the  Prophet's  utterances  ;  and  though  we 
may  refuse  to  beheve  the  authenticity  of  a  large 
proportion  of  the  traditions  on  which  the  reasoning 
is  based,  it  seems  difficult  to  put  the  invention  of 
them  later  than  the  first  century :  if  the  maxims 
were  not  the  hasty  and  capricious  utterances  of  the 
Prophet,  they  were  formulated  by  persons  no  more 
capable  of  improvisation.  If  we  wish  to  know  what 
is  the  age  at  which  human  beings  become  responsible 
agents,  it  is  settled  by  the  story  of  a  man  being 
rejected  as  a  soldier  at  the  age  of  fourteen,  but 
admitted  in  the  following  year;  what  we  may  be  clear 
about  is  that  this  story  settled  the  question,  and  it 
makes  little  difference  whether  there  was  any  truth  in 
it.  The  growth  of  this  subject,  then,  resembles  the 
growth  of  Arabic  grammar.  A  few  ideas,  the  rudi- 
ments of  grammatical  categories,  were  got  from  the 
Greeks  through  the  intermediation  of  the  Syrians ; 
but  the  rest  of  the  fabric  is  Islamic,  built  up  by 
observation  of  the  usage  of  the  Koran,  and  to  some 
extent  that  of  the  language  actually  spoken  in 
Arabia.  In  both  cases  the  fabric  is  so  vast  that 
these  foundation  stones  are  all  but  concealed. 


LECTURE    IV 

THE    STATUS    OF    THE    TOLEKATED    CULTS 

The  Prophet's  chief  experiment  in  constructive 
poKtics  was  the  institution  of  tolerated  cults — a  sort 
of  caste-system,  since  by  this  arrangement  whole 
groups  of  the  population  were  to  enjoy  a  special 
status.  Certain  religious  communities  were  to  be 
allowed  to  remain  outside  the  Moslem  brotherhood, 
unmolested  on  condition  of  their  paying  tribute ; 
only  various  disabiHties  were  imposed  upon  them. 
This  institution  differed  from  other  caste-systems  in 
one  notable  matter:  it  was  in  the  competence  of 
any  member  of  the  tolerated  cults  at  any  moment 
to  join  the  dominant  community,  by  pronouncing 
the  Moslem  creed.  In  other  countries  transference 
from  one  caste  to  a  higher  was  an  impossibility,  the 
castes  being  supposed  to  be  an  ordinance  of  nature 
which  no  human  power  could  alter ;  or  could  only 
be  brought  about  by  the  special  favour  of  the 
sovereign,  usually  as  a  reward  for  eminent  service. 
The  experiment  was  started  so  late  in  the  Prophet's 
career  that  the  resulting  problems  scarcely  made 
themselves  felt  during  his  lifetime  ;  he  apparently 
desired  that  so  long  as  tribute  was  paid,  there  should 

99 


100    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

be  as  little  interference  as  possible  with  Jews  and 
Christians ;  the  incorporation  within  the  Islamic 
empire  of  whole  countries  in  which  the  population 
was  Christian  commenced  after  his  death.  Pro- 
selytism  from  Christianity  to  Islam  scarcely  took 
place — at  any  rate  on  a  noticeable  scale — before  the 
expansion  of  the  latter  under  the  first  Caliphs. 

So  long  as  all  that  Islam  demanded  from  members 
of  tolerated  cults  was  tribute,  it  might  be  argued 
that  their  condition  compared  favourably  with  that 
of  the  Moslems.  For  the  difference  between  the 
tribute  paid  by  the  Christians  and  the  alms  paid  by 
Moslems  might  seem  to  be  purely  a  difference  in 
name.  It  was  the  claim  for  alms  which  determined 
the  Arabs  to  revolt  after  the  Prophet's  death.  The 
difference  in  name  was,  however,  considerable ;  the 
alms  constituted  an  honourable  payment,  purifying 
the  Believer  who  contributed  it :  whereas  the  tribute 
was  a  form  of  humiliation,  which  might  even  be 
regarded  as  a  brand  of  slavery.^  Acceptance  of  Islam, 
on  the  other  hand,  involved  a  whole  number  of 
onerous  obligations  :  various  religious  exercises,  some 
of  them — e.g.  the  fasting-month — by  no  means  accept- 
able ;  and,  besides,  compulsory  service  in  the  field, 
which,  as  we  learn  from  the  Koran  itself,  was  at  times 
found  irksome,  notwithstanding  the  prospects  of  booty 
and  Paradise.  Although  the  historical  evolution  of  the 
Islamic  caste-system  was  by  no  means  favourable  to 
the  subject  caste,  some  of  the  traces  of  this  original 
condition   survived.     Exemption   from   military  ser- 

1  Shafi%  Umm  vii.  292. 


THE   STATUS    OF   THE   TOLERATED    CULTS       101 

vice  and  from  the  burdensome  ceremonies  of  Islam 
aided  the  tolerated  communities  in  a  variety  of  ways, 
and  counteracted  some  of  the  effects  of  humihation 
and  oppression. 

Unforeseen  problems  arose,  which  had  to  be  settled 
so  far  as  possible  by  the  maxims  of  the  Koran. 
Certain  texts  made  it  clear  that  the  family  tie  was 
cancelled  by  the  religious  change ;  the  Jew  or 
Christian  who  adopted  Islam  had  stepped  out  of  the 
family  to  which  he  formerly  belonged,  and  had  formed 
a  new  connection  ;  the  rights  and  duties  which  had 
formerly  belonged  to  him  had  all  lapsed.  He  then 
forfeited  any  claim  to  inheritance  which  his  member- 
ship of  a  family  had  given  him,  and  also  deprived  that 
family  of  all  right  to  inherit  from  him.  The  doctrine 
that  there  was  no  inheritance  between  members  of 
different  religious  communities  came  to  be  asserted 
with  such  strictness  that  some  jurists  extended  it 
to  Islamic  and  even  to  Jewish  and  Christian  sects. 

To  some,  however,  this  seemed  to  be  dealing  justice 
too  evenly  between  Believers  and  Unbelievers  ;  it  was 
argued  that  where  conversion  to  the  dominant  com- 
munity took  place  it  should  only  confer  advantages 
and  should  occasion  no  detriment ;  let  the  convert 
retain  his  claims  to  inheritance  if  he  had  any,  only 
let  his  unbelieving  relatives  be  excluded  from  any 
share  in  his  estate.  Provision  had  also  to  be  made 
for  the  rare  case  wherein  the  transference  took  place 
in  the  opposite  direction,  i.e.  from  Islam  to  Judaism 
or  Christianity;  such  a  pervert  doubtless  forfeited 
his  life,  but  did  his  believing  family  thereby  lose  all 


102    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

claim  to  what  they  might  otherwise  expect  to  be 
theirs  ?  The  ordinary  administrator  would  settle  this 
question  in  the  interest  of  the  Moslem  community, 
and  could  argue  that  in  certain  other  cases  Islam 
scored  both  ways,  or  at  any  rate  made  no  pretence 
of  treating  the  subject  cults  as  equal  to  itself.  The 
most  familiar  example  is  the  case  of  women :  a 
Moslem  man  may  marry  a  Christian  or  Jewish 
woman,  but  a  INloslem  woman  may  not  become  the 
wife  of  any  but  a  Moslem  man.  We  are  apt,  when 
we  eulogise  Islam  for  its  unification  of  races,  to  forget 
that  this  unification  is  somewhat  one-sided.  The 
system  regularly  demands  that  the  mate  of  a  Moslem 
woman  must  be  her  equal,  but  makes  no  similar 
claim  for  the  Moslem  man — in  whose  case  the  word 
"  mate "  is  scarcely  suitable.  The  needs  of  the 
treasury  were  against  retaining  the  Moslem  convert's 
right  to  an  inheritance  from  his  former  family ;  the 
state  was  surer  of  its  right  when  the  inheritance 
remained  with  Jews  or  Christians.  And  the  case  of 
the  pervert  from  Islam  was  rather  academical  than 
practical.  The  estimable  Ali,  it  was  said,  when 
ordering  the  execution  of  a  pervert,  probably  on  a 
historic  occasion,  had  assigned  his  estate  to  his 
Moslem  relatives.  Shafi'i,  insisting  on  the  maxim 
that  there  is  no  inheritance  between  members  of 
different  creeds,  decided  that  by  perversion  a  man 
deprived  his  Moslem  relatives  of  their  right  to  his 
estate.  A  theory  which  had  been  devised  for  dealing 
with  such  cases — viz.  that  the  death  of  the  pervert 
may  be  presumed,  because  any  Moslem  who  found 


THE   STATUS   OF  THE   TOLERATED   CULTS       103 

him  would  have  the  right  to  kill  him,  whence  his 
estates  might  be  divided  on  perversion  as  they  would 
be  after  death — is  rejected  on  the  ground  that  there 
is  always  the  chance  of  reconversion,  which  would 
restore  to  the  man  his  rights  as  a  Moslem.  Never- 
theless, though  Shafi'i  neglects  the  interests  of  the 
pervert's  family,  he  does  not  neglect  those  of  the 
state.  If  the  pervert  be  out  of  reach,  his  goods  may 
be  considered  spoils  of  war,  and  assigned  to  the 
treasury  for  the  community. 

Several  questions  which  arose  from  the  recognition 
of  tolerated  cults  were  connected  with  the  poll-tax. 
Although  the  Moslem  conquerors  seized  some  of 
the  best  provinces  of  the  Byzantine  empire,  they 
recognised  the  independence  of  the  latter,  and 
repeatedly  treated  with  it ;  there  was  ordinarily  no 
question  of  enforcing  on  it  the  payment  of  the  tribute 
which  was  enforced  on  the  Christian  residents  of  the 
provinces  which  had  been  conquered.  How  far  was 
this  state  of  things  in  accordance  with  the  doctrine 
that  Islam  was  to  triumph  over  all  other  cults,  and  that 
the  realisation  of  that  triumph  was  the  duty  of  the 
Moslems  ?  The  orthodox  explanation  was  that  a 
respite  had  been  granted  to  the  Greek  empire  because 
Heraclius  had  treated  with  respect  the  letter  of  the 
Prophet  which  bade  him  adopt  Islam  ;  unlike  the 
Persian  monarch  who  had  torn  the  Prophet's  letter 
to  pieces,  Heraclius  had  preserved  the  despatch  sent 
him  in  musk.  The  reception  of  the  missive  by  the 
Greek  emperor  is  indeed  a  very  favourite  subject  of 
myths   on   the   part   of    the   Prophet's   biographers. 


104    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

who  regularly  represent  the  emperor's  conduct  in  a 
favourable  light ;  indeed,  suppose  him  to  have  been 
converted,  but  to  have  had  his  hand  forced  by  the 
ecclesiastics.  Heraclius  thus  secured  the  continuance 
of  his  empire ;  only,  in  order  that  the  Meccan 
merchants  who  had  traded  with  Syria  might  not  be 
damnified,  the  divine  providence  had  ordained  that 
Syria  should  be  withdrawn  from  Byzantine  rule. 

It  must,  however,  be  emphasised  that  the  duty 
of  the  Moslem  sovereign  to  reduce  all  non -Moslem 
states  to  subjection  by  force  of  arms  never  actually 
lapsed,  though  circumstances  may  have  rendered  it 
difficult  or  even  impossible  to  execute.  The  fact  of 
an  independent  Christian  state  existing — or  indeed  of 
such  a  state  existing  belonging  to  any  other  religious 
community — is  a  sufficient  ground  for  an  attack. 
And  the  court  historian  of  the  Ottomans,  who  wrote 
with  the  express  object  of  glorifying  the  first  eight 
Sultans  of  that  dynasty,  makes  it  the  great  merit  of 
Othman,  the  founder,  that  he  attacked  the  Christian 
strongholds  in  Asia  Minor  and  so  increased  the 
territory  of  Islam  ;  there  were  prosperous  cities  in  his 
neighbourhood,  which  owing  to  the  weakness  of 
Byzantium  and  the  rival  empire  could  not  defend 
themselves  against  aggression,  and  pay  with  employ- 
ment was  wanted  for  the  refugees  from  the  relics 
of  the  Seljuk  empire ;  Othman,  according  to  this 
chronicler,  who  took  care  to  say  nothing  which  his 
masters  would  not  approve,  attacked  these  cities,  and 
forced  the  inhabitants  either  to  adopt  Islam  or  to 
pay  tribute ;  the  old  industries  were  ruined,  and  the 


THE   STATUS   OF  THE   TOLERATED   CULTS       105 

churches  with  few  exceptions  turned  into  mosques. 
We  are  not  here  concerned  with  the  question 
whether  other  reHgious  chiefs  adopted  the  same  view 
of  their  duties  towards  their  neighbours,  but  merely 
with  the  question  whether  this  was  or  was  not  the 
view  taken  by  orthodox  Islam. 

In  the  second  place,  the  word  "  the  Book,"  occurring 
in  the  text  which  enjoins  warring  on  those  who  had 
been  given  it  until  they  paid  tribute,  admits  of  various 
interpretations.  And  indeed  the  phrase  ''  who  have 
been  given  the  Book  "  need  not  imply  that  they  still 
possessed  it ;  hence  Ali  is  quoted  for  the  assertion 
that  the  Persian  Mazdians  had  once  possessed  a 
revealed  book,  which  had  been  taken  away  from 
them  owing  to  the  crime  of  a  certain  king.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  tense  of  the  words  "  who  have  been 
given  the  Book  "  confines  the  permission  of  tribute  in 
lieu  of  Islam  to  those  who  had  received  the  Book 
before  the  revelation  of  the  Koran ;  whence  only 
those  communities  which  had  followed  one  of  these 
systems  before  that  memorable  date  can  claim 
exemption  from  death  or  conversion.  And  since  the 
text  speaks  of  fighting  with  these  sectarians  till  they 
pay  tribute,  it  follows  that  only  the  fighters  among 
them  have  to  pay  it :  women  and  children  are 
excluded.  The  theory  that  only  those  communities 
have  a  right  to  toleration  who  never  possessed  a  better 
revelation  is  carried  out  to  its  logical  consequence. 
Thus  an  Arab  Jew  or  Christian  is  not  to  have  the 
rights  of  other  Jews  and  Christians,  on  the  ground 
that  the  Arabs  originally  belonged  to  the  Hanifite 


106    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

faith  and  abandoned  it ;  they  are  therefore  in  the 
position  of  renegades. 

For  the  same  reason  conversion  from  one  tolerated 
cult  to  another  is  not  permitted,  since  the  principle 
which  underlies  toleration  is  continuity ;  and  indeed 
in  the  instructions  which  the  Prophet  is  supposed  to 
have  given  his  earliest  lieutenants,  the  wording  of  the 
order  was  to  the  effect  that  no  Jew  or  Christian 
should  be  forced  to  abandon  the  faith  wherein  he  had 
been  born.  But  when  once  the  continuity  has  been 
snapped,  the  Jew  or  Christian  may  be  supposed  to 
have  returned  to  natural  religion  ;  if,  therefore,  he 
joins  a  non- Moslem  community,  it  may  be  argued 
that  he  is  in  the  position  of  a  pervert.  This  principle 
occasioned  some  difficulty  when  missions  began  to 
work  among  the  Christian  populations  of  the  Ottoman 
empire ;  when  the  Foreign  Office  in  the  year  1840 
demanded  a  firman  for  the  erection  of  a  missionary 
Protestant  church  in  Jerusalem,  the  reply  was  at  first 
offered  that  the  Christian  subjects  of  the  Porte  were 
forbidden  by  law  to  pass  from  one  community  to 
another.^ 

The  different  Christian  sects  were  locally  separated 
in  the  Moslem  empire ;  and  since  they  were  placed 
under  responsible  heads  who  were  in  direct  communi- 
cation with  the  Moslem  officials,  it  is  probable  that 
the  difficulties  which  arose  from  this  provision  were 
ordinarily  small.  It  is  noteworthy  that  fresh  Jewish 
sects  sprang  up  under  Islamic  rule,  but  fresh 
Christian  sects  appear  not  to  have  started  in  these 

^  Engelhardt,  Tcmzimat,  i.  6l. 


THE   STATUS   OF   THE   TOLERATED   CULTS       107 

regions.  The  reason  is  that  the  Moslem  conquest  of 
Mesopotamia  meant  the  renaissance  of  Jewish  Utera- 
ture,  but  the  practical  death  of  the  Christian  literature 
of  the  East. 

An  important  feature  in  the  condition  of  the 
tolerated  cults  according  to  the  Islamic  system  was 
that  the  members  were  not  to  bear  arms,  or  take 
part  in  the  wars  of  the  community.  Nevertheless, 
Shafi'i  reserves  to  the  sovereign  the  right  to  employ 
these  persons  as  soldiers,  supposing  that  the  Prophet's 
refusal  to  allow  the  Jews  to  fight  on  his  side  at  Badr 
was  cancelled  by  a  later  precedent :  the  precedent 
which  he  cites  is  absolutely  fictitious  and  a  gross 
anachronism ;  two  years  after  Badr,  he  states,  the 
Prophet  employed  Jewish  auxiliaries  of  the  Banu 
Kainuka  against  Khaibar.  However,  if  there  be  any 
truth  in  the  Prophet's  biography,  the  Banu  Kainuka 
were  banished  shortly  after  Badr,  having  escaped 
with  difficulty  from  a  general  massacre ;  and  the 
attack  on  Khaibar  was  five  years  after  Badr.  Later 
exponents  of  Shafi*i's  code  make  it  a  condition  of  the 
employment  of  Unbelievers  as  troops  that  the  sove- 
reign has  convinced  himself  of  their  loyalty,  and  that 
they  do  not  outnumber  the  Believers  in  the  army. 
Malik  appears  to  have  confined  the  possibility  of 
employing  Unbelievers  in  campaigns  to  work  that 
was  not,  strictly  speaking,  fighting — as  sappers  or 
engineers/  He  is  unaware  of  any  precedent  wdiereby 
the  Prophet's  practice  with  regard  to  Badr  was 
annulled  ;  indeed,  he  asserts  that  when  Medinah  was 

1   Mudawwanat  iii.  40. 


108    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

itself  attacked  in  the  following  year  he  declined  to 
avail  himself  of  the  help  of  the  Jewish  residents. 
The  assignation  of  the  spoil  in  the  case  of  raids 
occupies  a  large  space  in  Moslem  law,  and  such  a 
share  so  clearly  falls  to  the  fighter  in  virtue  of  his 
being  a  Moslem  that  there  are  difficulties  about 
assigning  it  to  an  Unbeliever ;  Shafi'i  therefore 
prefers  that  when  such  persons  are  employed  they 
should  be  treated  as  hirelings/ 

The  introduction  of  weapons  of  precision  must 
have  made  a  great  difference  in  the  question  of 
bearing  arms,  and  the  meaning  of  the  word  "disarm  " 
have  come  to  be  far  more  definite  than  when  personal 
strength  counted  for  everything  in  warfare.  Until 
the  attempt  to  introduce  universal  service  in  the 
Ottoman  empire,  when  Christians  fought  side  by 
side  with  Moslems,  it  would  appear  that  the  former 
were  regularly  members  of  independent  communities ; 
it  is  highly  improbable  that  the  loyalty  of  the 
Christians  resident  within  the  Islamic  empires  could 
be  trusted,  and  this,  as  we  have  seen,  is  a  condition 
of  their  employment.  Even  when  Islamic  cities 
were  undergoing  siege,  it  is  probable  that  the 
Christian  population  could  not  be  trusted  to  take 
part  in  the  defence  ;  but  our  records  seem  singularly 
silent  on  this  subject.  The  fact  appears  to  be,  that 
after  some  futile  attempts  at  rising  in  the  provinces 
which  contained  Christian  communities,  the  latter 
gave  up  the  idea  of  forcible  resistance  to  oppression 
as  hopeless ;   at  times  they  welcomed  invaders,  and 

1  Umm  iv.  177. 


THE   STATUS   OF   THE   TOLERATED   CULTS       109 

on  certain  occasions  indulged  in  short-lived  triumphs 
when  those  invaders  had  been  successful.  The  jurists, 
however,  forbid  them  to  possess  arms,  and  about  this 
there  would  seem  to  be  general  agreement :  the  aban- 
donment of  arms  is  one  of  the  conditions  to  be 
demanded  when  they  capitulate.  It  is  rather  curious 
that  in  the  Prophet's  biography  the  Jews  figure  as 
dealers  in  arms  and  armour  just  as  they  do  in  the 
medieeval  England  of  Scott.  Apparently  they  could 
be  trusted  not  to  use  them  effectively. 

Another  matter,  for  which,  however,  some  guidance 
might  be  found  in  the  old  Roman  law,  was  the  extent 
to  which  the  Moslem  government  should  interfere 
with  the  practices  of  the  protected  communities. 
Shafi'i  poses  the  interesting  question  whether  if  a 
protected  community  were  raided  by  a  foreign  power, 
which  proceeded  to  prevent  it  from  exercising  its 
rights — i.e.  drinking  wine  and  eating  pork — it  would 
be  the  duty  of  the  Moslem  powers  to  rescue  these 
clients,  and  so  enable  them  to  go  back  to  practices 
which  the  law  of  the  Moslems  condemned :  and  he 
decides  that  this  would  be  the  Moslem  government's 
duty.  He  holds  also  that  the  contract  whereby  the 
Jews  and  Christians  are  protected  involves  in  it 
obedience  on  the  part  of  the  members  of  these 
communities  to  their  own  magistrates :  these  magis- 
trates are  as  much  officers  of  the  ruling  powers  as 
are  the  Moslem  magistrates.  If  a  dispute  between 
members  of  these  communities  be  referred  to  the 
Moslem  magistrate,  he  is  not  obliged  to  decide  it ; 
if  the  parties  refuse  to  submit  to  the  ruling  of  their 


110    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

own  magistrate,  they  may  be  charged  with  violation 
of  their  contract  with  the  Moslems ;  only,  if  the 
JNIoslem  magistrate  choose  to  decide  the  case,  then 
he  must  decide  it  according  to  Moslem  law.  And 
that  Moslem  law  precludes  the  acceptance  of  any 
but  Moslem  witnesses. 

This  last  seems  a  harsh  enactment,  and  one  system 
admits  the  evidence  of  the  tolerated  cults  against 
each  other ;  but  difficulties  followed  from  accepting 
any  other  doctrine.  For  if  witnesses  be  accepted 
from  any  other  community  than  the  Moslem,  they 
must  submit  to  analogous  tests ;  and  then,  just  as 
the  most  pious  Moslem  is  the  most  credible  witness, 
so  the  most  pious  Jew  or  Christian  will  be  the  most 
credible  among  his  co-religionists  :  which  leads  to  the 
strange  result  that  the  persons  most  averse  from 
Islam  will  be  those  to  whose  witness  Islam  attaches 
value.  Dating  by  the  Christian  Easter  was  forbidden 
on  the  ground  that  its  calculation  was  made  by 
Christians  ;  it  is  not  clear  whether  Shafi'i  was  aware 
that  the  dating  had  anything  to  do  with  the  moon.-^ 
Moreover,  the  law  of  Islam  only  accepts  the  evidence 
of  freemen  ;  if  it  were  to  admit  that  of  Jews  or 
Christians  it  would  be  placing  the  free  Unbeliever 
above  the  believing  slave  ;  which  is  expressly  against 
the  valuation  of  the  Koran."  And,  indeed,  the  fact 
that  the  free  Moslem  is  not  necessarily  a  qualified 
witness  without  attestation  to  his  character  makes 
this  question  of  employing  witnesses  of  other  com- 
munities  exceedingly  difficult.      For   the    character 

1  Umm  iii.  85.  2  n  ^^.l. 


THE   STATUS   OF   THE   TOLERATED   CULTS       111 

of  a  witness  in  the  case  of  a  Moslem  means  his 
observation  of  Islamic  ordinances. 

Still,  it  was  impossible  to  reject  all  non-lVIoslem 
attestations,  and  an  oath  may  be  exacted  from  a  Jew 
or  a  Christian.  An  interesting  case  of  such  exaction 
is  where  a  Jew  or  Christian  has  sold  a  Moslem  wine 
and  declares  that  he  was  not  aware  that  such  sale 
was  forbidden.  The  magistrate  is  to  demand  an 
oath,  and  if  the  dealer  takes  it  he  is  acquitted.^ 
Different  views  were  held  as  to  the  formula  of  the 
oath  to  be  employed.  Some  said  it  was  to  be  by 
Allah  only ;  others  allowed  an  oath  by  the  Law  or 
the  Gospel.  And  some,  in  order  to  ensure  greater 
sanctity,  maintained  that  it  should  be  taken  in  some 
place  which  the  member  of  the  tolerated  cult  held 
sacred. 

It  was,  of  course,  impossible  for  the  government 
to  avoid  the  exercise  of  all  jurisdiction  in  the  case 
of  members  of  tolerated  cults.  To  a  certain  extent 
Islamic  law  had  to  be  imposed  upon  them,  and  that 
distinction  between  civil  and  criminal  law  which  the 
Moslem  jurists  are  on  the  w^hole  justly  charged  with 
ignoring  forces  its  way  to  the  front.  Malik  is  asked 
why  he  enforces  on  a  Christian  the  Moslem  penalty 
(handcutting)  when  he  is  found  guilty  of  stealing, 
but  does  not  enforce  it  in  the  case  of  adultery, 
when  the  crime  is  committed  by  non-Moslems :  his 
reply  is  that  the  former  only  is  injurious  to  the 
community.  In  the  main,  then,  the  principle  was 
to   leave  these  communities  to  their   own   practices 

1  Umm  iv.  126. 


112    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

when  the  life  and  property  of  the  public  were  not 
thereby  endangered,  but  to  interfere  w^hen  such 
danger  was  involved ;  the  Moslem  government  does 
not,  however,  undertake  to  protect  the  honour  of 
the  subject  sects,  and  only  interferes  to  protect  it 
when  Moslem  interests  are  involved.  An  exceptional 
case  of  interference  with  custom  is  its  refusal  to 
tolerate  the  incestuous  marriages  with  which  the 
Mazdians  were  charged.  It  acknowledges  property 
in  wine  and  swine,  when  Christians  are  the  possessors, 
but  does  not  acknowledge  it  when  they  are  in  the 
possession  of  JNIoslems.  This  ruling,  though  appar- 
ently in  accordance  with  justice,  was  not  approved 
by  many  pious  sovereigns ;  in  Egyptian  history  we 
read  not  unfrequently  of  general  raids  on  the  wine 
stores  and  wholesale  destruction  of  their  contents. 
The  excuse  in  such  cases  was  doubtless  that  Moslems 
could  not  be  prevented  from  procuring  them  when 
stores  existed  in  their  neighbourhood. 

For  cases  of  murder  wherein  members  of  tolerated 
communities  were  involved  assimilation  of  some  sort 
to  Moslem  law  was  necessary,  and  complications 
arose  from  the  differences  of  social  organisation  which 
resulted.  A  murder,  by  the  law  of  the  Koran,  was 
regarded  as  an  injury  to  the  family  which  thereby 
lost  a  member,  and  which  might  either  retaliate  by 
taking  the  life  of  the  murderer,  or  might  instead 
take  a  sum  of  money  or  its  equivalent  in  goods  ;  a 
difficulty  being  that  the  whole  family  of  the  murdered 
man  had  to  agree  before  execution  could  take  place, 
and  this,  according  to  one  system,  involved  waiting 


i 

^ 


THE  STATUS  OF  THE  TOLERATED  CULTS   US 

until  any  minors  in  the  dead  man's  family  had  grown 
up.^  Shafi'i  regards  all  non-Moslem  sects  as  one 
community  for  this  purpose ;  idolaters  are  to  be 
allowed  to  retaliate  on  Jews,  and  conversely.  He 
also  gives  these  sects  the  right  of  mutual  inheritance, 
which,  as  has  been  seen,  some  jurists  disapproved. 

With  regard  to  the  relative  value  of  Moslem  and 
Unbelieving  lives,  it  would  appear  that  the  view  of 
the  earlier  period  was  more  equitable  than  that  of  the 
later  ;  as  has  been  seen,  a  number  of  traditions  are 
cited  according  to  which  such  convinced  and  even 
fanatical  Moslems  as  Omar  and  Ali,  when  a  Moslem 
had  murdered  a  Christian,  handed  the  murderer  over 
to  the  family  of  the  murdered  man,  or  else  themselves 
ordered  his  execution ;  and  a  tradition  even  ascribed 
an  act  of  strict  justice  of  this  sort  to  the  Prophet 
himself  Other  traditions  were  cited  to  show  that 
in  the  earliest  period  the  blood-money  was  the  same 
for  all  denominations ;  and  both  these  theories  were 
accepted  by  Abu  Hanifah,  whose  code  is  official  in 
the  Ottoman  empire.  Shafi'i,  however,  while  de- 
manding the  execution  of  an  Unbeliever  for  the 
murder  of  a  Moslem,^  emphasises  the  maxim, 
"  Believer  is  not  to  be  slain  for  Unbeliever,"  and 
assesses  the  blood-money  for  a  Jew  or  Christian  at 
one-third  that  due  for  a  Moslem,  while  he  fixes  that 
for  a  Mazdian  at  one-fifth.  The  Moslem  murderer 
of  an  Unbeliever  is,  however,  according  to  him,  to  be 
punished,  but  not  excessively,  whether  the  punish- 
ment take  the  form  of  stripes  or  of  imprisonment. 

1  Umm  vii.  136.  2  /^^^^^  yi.  33. 

8 


\ 

\ 


114    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

The  former  should  not  be  numerous  ;  and  the  period 
of  imprisonment  ought  not  to  be  longer  than  a  year. 

The  maxim  quoted  is,  of  course,  ascribed  to  the 
Prophet,  though  different  views  were  held  as  to  the 
occasion  whereon  he  delivered  it.  In  mitigation  of 
it,  it  must  be  observed  that  murder  was  not  regarded 
as  a  criminal  offence,  and  the  state  provided  no 
executioner  for  such  cases :  the  executioner  was  to 
be  a  member  of  the  injured  family,  who  had  to 
obtain  their  authorisation  before  he  could  proceed 
to  retaliate :  and  it  might  well  be  undesirable  to 
permit  the  execution  of  a  member  of  the  ruling  caste 
by  a  tributary  in  any  circumstances.  To  us  it  seems 
extraordinary  that  whereas  in  the  case  of  some  other 
crimes  commutation  of  punishment  is  not  permitted, 
in  this  case  it  is. 

Even  in  modern  times  there  has  been  grave 
difficulty  in  forcing  Islamic  sovereigns  to  introduce 
equality  between  their  subjects  in  this  matter. 
It  was  asserted  that  the  first  time  when  any  inde- 
pendent Moslem  community  had  executed  INIoslems 
for  the  murder  of  Christians  was  after  the  lamentable 
massacres  of  Adana  ;  and  it  will  be  remembered  that 
English  journalists  dreaded  the  results  of  the  execu- 
tion of  Butrus  Pasha's  murderer  on  the  ground  that 
in  Egypt  the  execution  of  a  Moslem  for  the  murder 
of  a  Christian  was  contrary  to  the  law.  One  would 
fancy  that  this  was  a  case  for  the  application  of  the 
maxim  mala  consuetudo  abolenda  est.  There  would 
seem  to  be  a  probability  that  cases  must  have 
occurred    before    the    Adana    affair    in   which   such 


THE   STATUS   OF   THE   TOEERATED   CULTS       115 

executions  were  ordered  by  Moslem  sovereigns,  for 
the  death-punishment  was  inflicted  in  all  Moham- 
medan states  with  great  readiness  and  capriciously. 
The  maxim  of  the  Prophet  which  has  been  quoted 
ordinarily  regulated  procedure. 

The  law-books  assume  that  both  Jews  and  Chris- 
tians recognise  the  institution  of  slavery  no  less  than 
Moslems ;  and  indeed  they  could  scarcely  do  other- 
wise, living  in  a  civilisation  that  was  based  on  this 
institution.  It  is,  however,  a  legal  principle  that  a 
Moslem  may  not  be  slave  to  a  member  of  a  tolerated 
cult ;  he  may  only  be  the  slave  of  another  Moslem. 
So  soon,  therefore,  as  a  slave  adopts  Islam,  it  is  the 
duty  of  the  governor  to  enforce  his  sale  by  his 
Christian  or  Jewish  master ;  just  as,  if  a  Christian 
or  Jewish  wife  adopts  Islam,  her  husband  is  com- 
pelled to  divorce  her,  or  else  to  adopt  the  religion 
himself.  Cases  of  difficulty  arise,  when  the  woman 
is  converted  during  the  husband's  absence ;  the 
governor  is  instructed  to  see  whether  the  absence 
is  likely  to  be  long  or  short ;  and  to  delay  the 
divorce  or  enforce  it  accordingly.  Malik  forbade 
a  Moslem  to  hire  himself  out  to  a  Christian  in  any 
capacity,  e.g,  as  agricultural  labourer.^  He  forbade 
him  to  let  his  house  to  anyone  who  intended  to  use 
it  for  the  sale  of  wine  or  pork. 

A  peculiar  case  of  disability  is  recorded  in  the 
legislation  of  the  pious  Caliph  Omar  II.,  who  enacted 
that  the  tax  on  trade  should  in  the  case  of  Christian  or 
Jewish  traders  be  double  of  what  was  paid  by  Moslems. 

1  Mudawwanat  xi.  75,  159. 


116    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

It  would  seem  that  the  relations  between  Moslems 
and  Christians  steadily  deteriorated,  doubtless  owing 
to  the  natural  effect  of  communities  with  different 
rights  and  of  different  status  living  side  by  side. 
During  the  earliest  period  the  relations  would  seem 
to  have  been  friendly  and  at  times  even  affectionate. 
The  persons  who  are  accused  of  doing  mischief  in 
the  land  are  said  to  raid  the  protected  cults. ^  Gover- 
nors who  are  sent  out  to  take  charge  of  provinces  are 
commanded  to  deal  justly  with  the  people  of  the 
dhimmah,^  and  Ali  in  his  dying  injunctions  to  his 
sons  insists  upon  this.^ 

A  scene  is  described  by  Tabari  which  occurred 
after  the  defeat  by  one  of  All's  generals  of  a  body 
of  rebels  who  had  been  joined  by  their  Christian 
neighbours.  In  accordance  with  the  Caliph's  orders 
the  Moslem  captives  are  released,  but  the  Christians 
with  their  families  are  to  be  led  off.  Their  Moslem 
allies  accompany  them  until  the  general  bids  them 
return ;  compelled  to  part,  they  embrace,  and  the 
scene  was  the  most  affecting  which  its  narrator  had 
ever  witnessed.  Presently  these  Christian  captives 
find  a  Moslem  chief  who  redeems  them  and  gives 
them  their  liberty  at  tremendous  cost ;  in  the 
attempt  to  pay  this  in  full  he  afterwards  loses 
his  liberty.  It  is  true  that  All's  general  in  his 
despatch  states  that  it  was  his  intention  to  give 
these  Christians  a  lesson  and  remind  them  that  they 
are  humble  and  degraded  ;  but  it  would  appear  that 

1  Tabari  i.  2922,  7  ;  2993,  21  ;  3303,  15. 

2  3247,1;  3430,  14.  ^  34^3^  5. 


THE   STATUS   OF  THE   TOLERATED   CULTS       117 

this   doctrine   had    not    yet    sunk    in    the    Moslem 
mind/ 

In  the  references  to  the  condition  of  the  Christian 
subjects  of  the  Moslem  empire  for  the  rest  of  the 
Umayyad  period  we  find  evidence  of  a  condition  of 
things  which  is  on  the  whole  satisfactory.  The 
authorities  regularly  regard  the  defence  of  the  Chris- 
tian populations  as  their  duty.^  The  usurper  Yazid, 
who  defended  his  usurpation  by  the  iniquities  of  his 
predecessor,  in  his  manifesto  declares  that  he  means 
to  watch  over  the  interests  of  these  subjects,  and  do 
nothing  which  will  tend  to  drive  them  from  their 
homes  or  reduce  their  birth-rate.^  A  son  of  the 
Caliph  Hisham  (who  died  in  125)  complained  to  his 
father  that  a  Christian  employe  had  struck  his  slave  ; 
the  Caliph  told  him  that  he  must  bring  an  action  in 
the  ordinary  way,  and  when  another  slave  of  the 
prince  took  the  law  into  his  own  hands,  he  was 
punished  by  the  sovereign.^  Deserting  soldiers  are 
charged  with  desiring  to  pillage  the  Christian  com- 
munities which  they  are  likely  to  pass  on  their  home- 
ward journey,  an  act  which  the  authorities  do  not 
countenance.^  The  accusation  which  meets  us  so 
frequently  at  later  times  of  undue  favour  being 
shown  to  Christians  who  usurp  the  public  offices 
scarcely  is  found  in  Umayyad  times.  Possibly  the 
idea  of  working  the  bureaux  themselves  was  not  yet 
quite  familiar  to  the  Moslems.     Some  fanatics  in  the 

1  Tabarii.  3438,  19.  ^  ii.  934. 

3  ii.  1831.  4  ii.  1731. 

8  ii.  1873. 


118    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

year  119  are  represented  as  charging  a  somewhat 
notorious  governor  with  destroying  mosques  to  build 
churches  and  synagogues,  and  giving  Moslem  women 
to  men  of  the  tolerated  sects,  but  our  historian  does 
not  confirm  the  accusation.^ 

From  the  third  century  onwards  we  find  repeated 
allusions  to  the  Ordinance  of  Omar,  or  general  regu- 
lation of  the  conduct  to  be  observed  by  members  of 
subject  cults,  on  pain  of  losing  their  treaty  rights. 
The  account  of  the  ordinance  is  correctly  given  by 
Sir  AVilliam  Muir :  "  The  dress  of  both  sexes  and  of 
their  slaves  must  be  distinguished  by  broad  stripes  of 
yellow  ;  they  were  forbidden  to  appear  on  horseback, 
and  if  they  rode  a  mule  or  an  ass,  the  stirrups  must 
be  of  wood  and  the  saddle  known  by  knobs  of  the 
same  material.  Their  graves  must  be  level  with  the 
ground,  and  the  mark  of  the  devil  placed  on  the  lintel 
of  their  doors.  Their  children  must  [not]  be  taught 
by  Moslem  masters.  Besides  the  existing  churches 
spared  at  the  conquest,  no  new  building  must  be 
erected  for  the  purpose  of  worship ;  no  cross  must 
remain  in  view  outside  nor  any  hammer  be  struck. 
They  must  refrain  from  processions  in  the  streets  at 
Easter  and  other  solemn  seasons."  Further,  it  would 
seem  that  the  churches  already  in  their  possession 
must  not  be  repaired,  and  that  they  must  be  em- 
ployed in  no  government  office,  wherein  Moslems 
would  be  under  their  orders.  The  nature  of  the 
saddle  permitted  was  such  as  to  suggest  humiliation  ; 
it  was  used  for  parading  persons  who  had  incurred 

1  Tabari  ii.  l623. 


THE   STATUS   OF   THE   TOLERATED   CULTS       119 

some  serious  punishment  about  the  streets.^  The 
intention  of  the  regulation  about  the  dress  was  to 
render  it  impossible  to  mistake  one  of  them,  even 
from  a  distance,  for  a  Moslem. 

It  can  scarcely  be  said  that  these  ordinances  are 
contrary  to  the  spirit  of  Islam  in  the  second  century, 
if  the  great  jurists  are  authoritative  interpreters  of  the 
latter.  "  Malik  was  asked  concerning  certain  persons 
who  went  raiding,  and  disembarked  in  Cyprus,  where 
they  proceeded  to  buy  sheep,  honey,  and  butter,  and 
payed  for  these  articles  with  dinars  and  dirhems  ; 
Malik  disapproved.  He  further  said  to  us  of  his  own 
initiative  :  *  I  strongly  object  to  coins  which  contain 
the  mention  of  God  and  His  Book  being  taken  and 
given  to  one  that  is  unclean.  I  disapprove  most 
strongly  of  such  a  practice.'  I  asked  him  whether 
we  might  make  purchases  with  dirhems  and  dinars 
of  traders  who  disembarked  on  our  coast,  or  of 
members  of  the  tolerated  cults.  He  replied  that 
he  disapproved.  He  was  asked  whether  money 
might  be  changed  by  changers  in  Moslem  markets 
who  belonged  to  these  cults.  He  replied  that  he 
disapproved.'"^ 

According  to  the  same  jurist  the  capitulation  of 
the  subject  cults  involves  their  paying  a  poll-tax  and 
a  land-tax.  Supposing  such  a  land-owner  sells  his 
land  to  a  Moslem,  he,  the  Christian  or  Jewish  owner, 
will  continue  to  pay  the  land-tax,  because  this  was 
one  of  the  conditions  of  his  capitulation  ;  and  he  is 
not  even  allowed  to  contract  out.     Supposing,  how- 

1  Tabarl  ii.  192,  7  ;  l653,  6.  ^  Mudawwanat  x.  102. 


120    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

ever,  that  the  Christian  owner  adopts  Islam,  then  he 
ceases  to  pay  either  poll-tax  or  land-tax. 

The  enactment  that  Jews  and  Christians  may  not 
ride  horses,  or  use  a  saddle  resembling  that  of  a 
horse,  is  found  in  the  code  of  Abu  Hanifah,  who  is 
ordinarily  the  most  tolerant  of  the  four.  It  is  agreed 
that  both  men  and  women  belonging  to  these  com- 
munities must  distinguish  themselves  in  their  dress 
from  the  Moslems,  and  also  that  their  houses  must  be 
distinguished  by  a  mark,  doubtless  no  honourable  one. 

The  pious  Caliph  Omar  II.,  in  a  rescript  to  a  gover- 
nor, told  him  to  destroy  no  churches  which  came 
within  the  contract,  but  also  to  let  no  new  ones  be 
built.^  The  question  whether  new  churches  may 
be  built  is  discussed  by  Malik,  who  replies  in  the 
negative.  His  pupil,  however,  makes  a  distinction 
between  cases.  Suppose  the  Christians  are  left  in 
possession  of  a  village,  having  agreed  to  pay  tribute  : 
in  such  a  case,  since  the  land  theoretically  still  belongs 
to  them,  there  can  be  no  objection  to  their  doing  what 
they  like  in  this  matter.  Where,  however,  the  chief 
community  is  Moslem,  or  where  a  city  has  been  built 
by  Moslems,  as,  e.g.^  Fustat,  Basrah,  or  Kufah,  they 
should  not  be  permitted  to  build.  The  same  code 
forbids  a  Moslem  to  sell  his  house  to  a  Christian  who 
has  any  intention  of  turning  it  into  a  church  ;  to  let 
his  house  for  similar  use ;  to  sell  an  animal  to  the 
member  of  a  non-Moslem  community  who  is  likely 
to  use  it  for  a  sacrifice  ;  or  to  hire  out  a  beast  to  be 
ridden  at  one  of  their  feasts.^ 

1  Tabari  ii.  1372.  2  Mudawwanat  xi.  ^^, 


THE   STATUS   OF   THE   TOLERATED   CULTS       121 

The  distinction  between  the  case  in  which  a  com- 
munity dwelKng  in  a  place  was  originally  Christian, 
and  that  of  Christian  residents  on  what  was  from  the 
first  Moslem  territory,  is  also  emphasised  by  Shafi'i.^ 
He  is  particularly  concerned  with  the  outward  display 
and  conduct  of  the  religious  ceremonies  belonging  to 
these  communities.  These  may  be  permitted  in  the 
former  case,  if  the  original  contract  involved  such 
permission ;  but  are  prohibited  in  the  latter.  If  the 
Christians  assemble  at  all  for  religious  worship,  it 
must  be  in  private,  and  their  voices  must  not  be 
raised.  Abu  Hanifah  gives  permission  for  the  repair 
of  such  churches  as  need  it,  but  it  is  probable  that 
this  was  not  permitted  by  the  other  jurists. 

The  question  to  whom  the  ordinance  goes  back 
does  not  concern  us ;  what  is  certain  is  that  it  was 
frequently  enforced.  The  historian  Tabari  was  born 
in  224  or  225  a.h.  ;  in  his  Chronicle  he  records 
the  events  of  the  year  235,  and  even  produces 
a  copy  of  a  proclamation  issued  by  the  Caliph  of 
the  time,  al-Mutawakkil.  This  letter  contains  the 
strictest  regulations  concerning  the  dress  which  the 
Christians  are  to  wear,  and  the  nature  of  the  saddles. 
In  Tabari's  account  the  Caliph  also  commanded 
that  all  new  churches  (i.e.  such  as  had  been  built 
since  the  capitulation  of  the  community)  should  be 
destroyed,  that  the  tenth  part  of  their  quarters 
should  be  seized,  and  a  mosque  be  built  upon  it  if 
it  were  of  sufficient  space,  otherwise  be  left  vacant ; 
wooden   demons  should   be  nailed  to  their  doors  in 

1  iv.  126. 


122    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

order  to  distinguish  a  Christian  house  from  a  Moslem 
house ;  they  were  to  be  expelled  from  all  offices  in 
which  they  had  any  control  over  Moslems,  their 
children  were  to  be  turned  out  of  all  Moslem  schools 
and  Moslems  were  not  to  give  them  instruction,  their 
graves  were  to  be  levelled  with  the  soil  in  order  that 
they  should  not  resemble  the  Moslem  graves.^ 

Tabari  is,  as  we  have  seen,  recording  an  affair  that 
took  place  when  he  was  ten  years  old  or  more.  In 
the  year  239,  when  he  was  fourteen  years  old, 
Mutawakkil  introduced  even  severer  measures,  for- 
bidding them  to  ride  horses ;  they  were  only  to  be 
allowed  asses  or  mules. 

Tabari  records  these  enactments  with  no  comment, 
and  without  adducing  any  justification  for  them. 

And  what  we  gather  from  the  chronicles  is  that 
the  Ordinance  of  Omar  was  at  any  time  liable  to  be 
enforced,  and  the  members  of  the  tolerated  com- 
munities were  never  safe  from  it.  It  was  not  found 
possible  to  keep  them  permanently  out  of  the  bureaux  ; 
for  the  public  business  had  somehow  to  be  transacted, 
and  few  Moslems  were  qualified  to  transact  it,  while 
little  confidence  was  reposed  in  those  who  were 
qualified.  The  disabilities  of  the  subject  communities 
in  a  way  ensured  their  fidelity.  But  their  promotion 
to  high  office  provoked  jealousy,  and  their  employers 
could  not  always  protect  them,  unwilling  as  they 
doubtless  often  were  to  get  the  business  of  the 
bureaux  into  disorder.  When  therefore  the  cry  was 
raised  that  the  Ordinances  of  Omar  had  been  violated, 

1  Tabari  iii.  1390. 


THE   STATUS   OF  THE   TOLERATED   CULTS       123 

the  jurists  naturally  went  with  the  people  in  the 
matter,  and  it  was  difficult  for  the  sovereign  to 
refuse  to  listen.  In  the  year  500  a  vizier  is  cashiered 
and  restored  to  office  on  condition  that  he  is  to 
employ  none  but  Moslems.  In  the  year  529  a 
Christian  vizier  is  appointed  by  the  Egyptian  Caliph  ; 
he  fills  his  offices  with  Armenians,  and  according  to 
the  historian  oppresses  and  humiliates  the  Moslems. 
Popular  discontent  finds  expression  in  an  organised 
revolt ;  the  vizier  is  compelled  to  flee  from  Cairo, 
and  finally  enters  a  monastery  ;  vengeance  is  dealt 
to  the  Armenians  whom  he  had  favoured.  We  are 
not  ordinarily  in  a  position  to  assess  the  rights  and 
wronofs  in  these  cases  ;  sometimes,  as  in  the  last  case, 
the  Moslem  historians  assert  that  there  was  provoca- 
tion for  the  attack,  sometimes  they  make  no  such 
suggestion.  What  we  infer  is  that  the  Ordinance  of 
Omar  was  frequently  enforced,  and  was  at  any  time 
likely  to  be. 

A  story  is  told  at  length  by  Makrizi  in  his  history 
of  the  year  700  (1301  a.d.),  made  accessible  by  M. 
Quatremere  in  his  French  translation.  A  vizier  of 
the  Maghribi  Sultan  arrives  in  Egypt,  and  sees  a  man 
on  horseback,  surrounded  by  numerous  mendicants, 
whom  he  asks  his  attendants  to  remove  from  his  path. 
The  vizier,  learning  that  this  horseman  was  a  Christian, 
was  deeply  wounded.  He  went  to  find  the  Emirs 
Baibars  and  Selar,  told  them  what  he  had  seen,  ex- 
pressed his  displeasure,  shed  copious  tears,  and  spoke 
of  the  Christians  with  extreme  contempt.  "  How," 
said  he,  "  can  you  hope  for  the  favour  of  heaven,  when 


124    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

Christians  in  your  country  ride  on  horseback,  wear 
white  turbans,  humiliate  the  Moslems,  and  make 
them  walk  in  their  trains  ? "  He  expressed  his  dis- 
approval in  strong  terms,  dilated  on  the  obligation 
imposed  on  the  members  of  the  government  to  keep 
these  tributaries  down  and  compel  them  to  adopt 
another  costume. 

The  Emirs  bring  the  matter  before  the  Sultan,  and 
an  edict  is  promulgated  enforcing  the  "  Ordinance  of 
Omar."  The  Christians  and  Jews  were  summarily 
dismissed  from  all  government  offices  ;  they  were  for- 
bidden to  ride  horses  or  even  mules.  The  Christians 
tried  hard  to  bribe  the  officials  to  get  some  relaxation 
of  these  orders ;  but  the  Emir  Baibars  "  displayed 
laudable  zeal  and  extreme  firmness  in  maintaining 
what  had  been  resolved."  The  populace,  encouraged 
by  a  legal  decision,  rushed  upon  the  churches  and 
synagogues  and  demolished  them.  All  houses 
occupied  by  Jews  or  Christians  in  Alexandria  which 
outtopped  Moslem  houses  were  pulled  down. 

The  theory  that  no  new  churches  might  be  built 
and  no  old  ones  repaired,  and  the  ordinance  that  no 
church  might  be  higher  than  a  mosque,  were  perpetual 
sources  of  chicanery.  In  the  chronicles  of  Egypt 
under  the  Mamlukes  references  to  this  matter  are 
exceedingly  common.  In  846  a.h.  it  is  discovered 
that  a  Melkite  church  and  certain  other  churches  in 
Cairo  had  been  repaired ;  the  authorities  close  them 
in  order  that  the  licence  for  their  repair  should  be 
exhibited.  An  order  bearing  date  734  is  produced, 
and  the  matter  is  referred  to  the  Shafi'ite  and  Malikite 


THE   STATUS   OF  THE   TOLERATED   CULTS       125 

Kadis.  In  the  meantime  some  trouble  occurs  with 
the  Jews  and  a  council  of  state  is  held,  after  which  it 
is  decided  that  the  old  contract  of  Omar  is  to  be  re- 
newed according  to  which  no  church,  synagogue,  or 
convent  is  to  be  repaired  or  renewed.  If  any  attempt 
at  repairing  one  be  made,  the  whole  building  is  to  be 
destroyed.  In  851  it  is  discovered  that  in  spite  of 
this  ordinance  repairs  have  been  effected  in  a  Melkite 
church,  and  the  Sultan  in  consequence  orders  its 
destruction. 

Clearly  it  was  useless  to  allow  them  the  churches 
at  all  unless  repairs  were  permitted.  It  would,  more- 
over, appear  that  in  this  case  permission  for  modest 
restoration  had  been  obtained  from  one  of  the  deputies 
of  the  Shafi'ite  Kadi.  Some  praying  at  the  tomb  of  a 
saint  was  required  before  the  order  could  be  procured 
for  the  destruction  of  the  church,  which  was  carried 
out  by  the  high  officers  of  the  state  deputed  for  that 
purpose  by  the  Sultan. 

In  the  year  849  a  charge  is  brought  before  the 
Sultan  that  on  Mount  Sinai  there  are  six  churches 
which  exceed  in  height  the  old  mosque  that  is  con- 
tinuous with  the  convent.  The  question  whether 
these  churches  are  not  also  posterior  to  the  capitula- 
tions is  also  raised.  A  commission  is  sent  to  inquire, 
and  in  consequence  the  churches  are  destroyed. 
Similarly,  in  850  a  complaint  is  brought  that  a 
Melkite  church  is  higher  than  a  neighbouring 
mosque,  and  the  Sultan  in  consequence  orders  its 
destruction. 

Nor  do  we  find  that  Christians  have  any  fixity  of 


126    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

tenure.  Ibn  lyas  records  that  in  the  year  759  it 
was  discovered  that  there  were  in  Egypt  25,000 
feddans  appropriated  to  churches  and  monasteries : 
doubtless  the  gifts  of  a  long  series  of  benefactors. 
The  finance  minister  before  whom  this  matter  was 
brought  was  deeply  chagrined ;  he  consulted  the 
Sultan,  who  issued  an  order  that  all  this  land  should 
be  withdrawn  from  the  possession  of  the  Christians 
and  distributed  among  the  military  chiefs  as  additional 
fiefs.  He  then  issued  a  further  order  for  a  general 
destruction  of  churches  and  monasteries.  The 
historian  does  not  even  suggest  that  there  was  any 
provocation  justifying  this  measure,  except  the  fact 
that  the  Christians  were  discovered  to  be  in  posses- 
sion of  the  property.  Similarly,  in  recording  the  life 
of  the  Sultan  Chakmak,  the  historian  records  that  he 
once  grew  angry  with  the  Christians  and  ordered  a 
number  of  their  churches  to  be  destroyed. 

It  is,  of  course,  possible  to  assert  that  the  series  of 
massacres  and  plunderings  which  have  marked  Moslem 
rule  over  Christians  had  always  some  occasion  which 
was  not  merely  the  difference  of  belief.  In  the 
history  of  Egypt  under  the  Mamlukes  we  find  the 
Christians  constantly  charged  with  incendiarism  ;  and, 
in  consequence,  during  the  reign  of  Baibars  the  whole 
community  ran  the  risk  of  being  committed  to  the 
flames.  But,  indeed,  to  suppose  that  in  Moslem 
countries  Christians  would  not  undergo  persecution 
for  their  faith  is  to  take  a  view  of  human  nature 
which  is  incompatible  with  facts.  The  governments 
were   ordinarily   tyrannical   and    extortionate ;  there 


THE   STATUS   OF  THE   TOLERATED   CULTS       127 

was  constant  misery  caused  by  usurpers  and  invaders  ; 
in  such  cases  the  resentment  which  cannot  with  safety 
be  directed  against  the  government  finds  its  vent,  wit:h 
the  approval  of  the  government,  in  attacks  upon  the 
defenceless  alien. 

Mr  Pickthall  speaks  of  poor  Moslems  and  Christians 
chaffing  each  other  on  the  subject  of  their  religions, 
but  that  has  at  all,  times  been  a  dangerous  game ;  for 
the  poor  are  those  who  care  most.  The  poor  in 
Egypt  or  Syria  are  the  scrupulous  worshippers,  who 
fast  throughout  Ramadan  and  say  their  five  daily 
orisons ;  comfort  brings  indifference.  When  in  the 
year  284  a.h.  there  was  a  rumour  that  a  Christian 
servant  of  the  Sultan's  Christian  physician  had  abused 
the  Prophet,  the  mob  of  a  whole  quarter  of  Baghdad 
was  in  an  uproar  ;  the  object  of  the  authorities  appears 
to  have  been  to  quiet  them.^ 

It  certainly  appears  from  Arabic  literature  that  the 
Moslems  regularly  were  invited  to  take  part  in 
the  Christian  festivals  and  habitually  enjoyed  this 
privilege  ; "  we  do  not — to  the  best  of  my  belief — 
read  often  of  return  invitations  ;  and,  indeed,  the  chief 
festivals  of  Islam  are  too  definitely  connected  with 
the  system,  too  exclusively  Islamic,  to  render  the 
presence  of  one  who  was  not  of  the  fold  any  more 
welcome  on  these  occasions  than  at  the  service  of  the 
mosque.  And  although  the  Christian  festivals  were 
on   the   whole  an  occasion  for  the  establishment  or 

1  Tabari  iii.  21 62. 

2  Masari'al-'Usshak382.    Ibn  Athir  x.  1 66.    Sibt  Ibn  al-Ta^awidhi, 
index. 


128    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF   MOHAMMEDANISM 

maintenance  of  friendly  relations  between  the  com- 
munities, the  Moslem  government  occasionally  went 
to  the  length  of  forcibly  suppressing  them  on  the 
ground  that  they  led  to  riot  and  debauchery.  In  the 
year  759  a.h.,  under  Sultan  Hasan,  the  feast  of  the  8th 
of  Bashans,  called  the  feast  of  the  Martyr,  whereon 
a  ceremony  connected  with  the  rising  of  the  Nile  was 
celebrated  and  had  been  from  time  immemorial,  was 
forcibly  suppressed  ;  the  church  which  contained  the 
relic  which  was  employed  was  demolished  and  the 
relic  itself  burned.  The  excuse  was  that  the  feast, 
which  was  celebrated  by  the  erection  of  booths  along 
the  Nile,  and  wherein  the  whole  Egyptian  population 
took  part,  led  to  drunkenness  and  debauchery.  In 
the  year  787  a.h.  Sultan  Barkuk  suppressed  the  Coptic 
New  Year's  Day ;  this  apparently  was  a  feast  which 
bore  some  resemblance  to  our  Boxing  Day,  in  that 
bakhshish  could  be  demanded  with  threats,  and  the 
persons  who  refused  to  bestow  were  liable  to  insult ; 
the  bazaars  and  markets  were  closed,  and  anyone 
walking  in  the  streets,  however  eminent,  might  be 
squirted  or  pelted  with  rotten  eggs.  The  festival 
resembled  a  Bank  Holiday  in  various  ways  ;  among 
them,  that  there  was  often  much  drunkenness  and 
brawling.  In  the  main,  however,  according  to  the 
description  which  the  historian  gives,  it  was  more 
likely  to  lead  to  good  feeling  between  the  different 
classes  of  the  population  than  anything  else. 

The  history  of  Christian  communities  under  Moslem 
rule  cannot  be  adequately  written ;  the  members  of 
those  comnmnities  had  no  opportunity  of  describing 


THE   STATUS   OF   THE   TOLERATED   CULTS       129 

their  condition  safely,  and  the  Moslems  naturally 
devote  little  space  to  their  concerns.  Generally 
speaking,  they  seem  to  have  been  regarded  as  certain 
old  Greek  and  Roman  sages  regarded  women :  as  a 
necessary  annoyance.  Owing  to  their  being  unarmed 
their  prosperity  was  always  hazardous ;  and  though  it 
is  true  that  this  was  the  case  with  all  the  subjects  of 
a  despotic  state  under  an  irresponsible  ruler,  the  non- 
Moslem  population  was  at  the  mercy  of  the  mob  as 
well  as  of  the  sovereign ;  they  were  likely  scapegoats 
whenever  there  was  distress,  and  even  in  the  best 
governed  countries  periods  of  distress  frequently  arise. 
Owing  to  the  unequal  assessment  of  their  rights  as 
compared  with  those  of  the  Moslems,  wrongs  com- 
mitted by  them  against  Moslems  were  likely  to  meet 
with  terrible  punishment,  whereas  wrongs  committed 
upon  them  were  likely  to  go  unpunished.  The 
terrible  reprisals  occasionally  taken  by  the  Christians 
when  they  momentarily  got  the  upper  hand,  as  when 
the  Mongols  obtained  possession  of  Damascus,  show 
that  the  relations  between  the  lower  classes  of  the 
two  communities  were  constantly  strained.  Writers 
of  whom  better  things  might  be  expected  often 
report  with  evident  delight  excesses  committed 
against  them,  and  the  name  "enemy  of  Allah"  is 
applied  to  them  indiscriminately  without  any  sense  of 
impropriety  in  the  expression. 

It  is  probable  that  the  attitude  of  the  sovereigns 
and  of  the  educated  classes  was  on  the  whole  friendly 
and  respectful.     It  is  rather  interesting  that  in  the 

records  which   we  have  of  discussions  in  the  fourth 

9 


130    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

century  of  Islam,  to  which  period  the  best  Arabic 
literature  on  the  whole  belongs,  the  audience,  who 
naturally  belong  to  a  superior  class,  do  not  approve  of 
fanatical  vituperation  ;  they  treat  the  Christian  repre- 
sentatives of  science  and  philosophy  as  deserving  of 
esteem.  And  it  would  seem  that  the  sovereigns  had 
good  grounds  for  preferring  to  employ  them  in  various 
offices  of  trust  in  lieu  of  employing  their  own  co- 
religionists. A  Fatimid  Caliph  wishes  to  poison  his 
son ;  he  applies  to  his  Jewish  physician ;  the  man 
replies  that  this  does  not  come  within  the  range  of 
his  science,  which  extends  no  further  than  the  very 
mildest  of  potions  and  lotions ;  the  Moslem  physician 
when  summoned  immediately  does  what  is  required. 
The  Christian  or  Jewish  minister  was  aware  that  any 
exercise  of  power  on  his  part  would  be  fiercely 
resented  by  the  Moslems  who  were  under  his  control ; 
the  paraphernalia  of  office  would,  in  his  case,  be 
regarded  as  intolerable  arrogance,  and  impious  pre- 
sumption, likely  to  bring  down  the  wrath  of  the 
Divine  Being  on  the  whole  community ;  any  severe 
measure  against  a  delinquent  Moslem  would  be 
treated  as  intentional  humiliation  of  Islam.  The 
culprit  would  have  the  sympathy  of  the  religious 
world,  and  his  cause  might  be  pleaded  in  the 
mosques.  Indeed  this  fact  was  discovered  very  early 
in  Moslem  history,  and  is  stated  by  the  Umayyad 
governor  'Ubaidallah  b.  Ziyad  quite  naively.  He 
employed  Persian  tax-collectors  because  if  an  Arab 
tax-collector  defalcated,  he  had  the  sympathy  of  his 
clan  ;  if  a  Persian  did,  the  governor  could  punish  him 


THE   STATUS   OF  THE   TOLERATED   CULTS       131 

without  danger.^  Hence  the  Christian  or  Jewish 
minister  had  the  very  strongest  reasons  for  displaying 
loyalty  to  his  chief ;  for  his  safety  depended  entirely 
on  his  doing  so,  since  the  highest  place  would  never 
be  given  to  one  of  his  persuasion.  It  is  true  that 
loyalty  to  a  sovereign  might  incur  the  vengeance  of 
the  next  usurper  who  displaced  him  ;  but  at  times 
these  persons  could  be  got  to  see  that  such  loyalty 
was  a  valuable  quality  which  would  be  of  service  to 
them,  when  the  permanent  official  came  into  their 
employ,  and  were  disposed  to  reward  it  even  when  it 
had  been  used  against  themselves. 

The  literature,  which  is  not,  like  the  Arabian  Nights, 
pure  fiction,  is  full  of  tales  of  terrible  oppression.  A 
form  of  passion  which  is  nameless  would  appear  at 
one  time  to  have  been  as  familiar  among  Moslems  as 
of  old  amonc^  Hellenes.  Christian  lads  seem  often  to 
have  been  the  unhappy  objects  of  this  passion.  A 
story  is  told  us  by  the  biographer  Yakut  of  a  young 
monk  of  Edessa  or  Urfah  who  had  the  misfortune  to 
attract  the  fancy  of  one  Sa'd  the  copyist.  The  visits 
and  attentions  of  this  Moslem  became  so  offensive 
that  the  monks  had  to  put  a  stop  to  them.  There- 
upon this  personage  pined  away,  and  was  finally  found 
dead  outside  the  monastery  wall.  The  Moslem 
population  declared  that  the  monks  had  killed  him, 
and  the  governor  proposed  to  execute  and  burn  the 
young  monk  who  had  occasioned  the  disaster,  and 
scourge  his  colleagues.  They  finally  got  off  by  paying 
a  sum  of  100,000  dirhems.^ 

1  Tabarl  ii.  458.  ^  Dictionary  of  Learned  Men,  ii.  26. 


132    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 


\ 


Forcible  conversions  to  Islam  appear  to  be  against 
the  express  orders  of  the  Prophet,  who  in  a  letter 
ascribed  to  him  by  his  biographer  insisted  that  neither 
Jew  nor  Christian  should  be  disturbed  in  his  religion 
so  long  as  he  paid  the  tax.  Such  events,  however, 
have  taken  place,  and  indeed  wholesale  on  certain 
occasions  ;  the  tolerated  cults  were  not  only  penalised 
by  the  mad  Hakim,  but  the  Al-mohades  in  Africa 
at  one  time  destroyed  all  places  of  worship  belonging 
to  Jews  and  Christians,  and  those  members  of  these 
cults  who  declined  to  change  had  to  escape  by  exile 
if  they  wished  to  preserve  their  lives.  At  certain 
periods  conversion  was  actually  discouraged  by  the 
maintenance  of  the  poll-tax  upon  the  converts ;  in 
express  defiance  of  the  spirit  of  Islam,  but  the  loss  to 
the  revenue  could  not  otherwise  be  met.  The  dis- 
abilities which  attached  to  the  tolerated  cults,  how- 
ever, had  their  natural  result  in  bringing  over  to  the 
dominant  community  those  who  were  either  careless 
about  the  faith  which  they  had  inherited,  or  whose 
career  lay  in  the  service  of  the  state,  and  who  found 
themselves  unable  to  discharge  that  service  efficiently 
so  long  as  their  religious  profession  excluded  them 
from  all  those  functions  for  which  the  profession  of 
Islam  was  required.  Hence  the  chronicles  record 
numerous  cases  of  men  who  had  obtained  some  pro- 
motion in  the  service  of  the  state  by  their  talents 
yielding  to  persuasion  on  the  part  of  the  sovereign  to 
accept  Islam  in  order  to  win  their  way  to  yet  higher 
honours.  Persons  who  quarrelled  with  their  co- 
religionists,   or    who    regarded    themselves    as    the 


THE   STATUS   OF   THE   TOLERATED   CULTS       133 

victims  of  oppression  among  them,  had  in  conversion 
to  Islam  a  fairly  easy  mode  of  obtaining  redress.  It 
would  seem,  however,  that  the  relations  between 
such  converts  and  their  former  associates  at  times 
remained  friendly,  the  imperious  necessity  of  the 
step  taken  being  often,  or  at  any  rate  sometimes, 
recognised. 

Moslem  authorities  delight  in  recording  conversions 
effected  by  other  causes  than  imperial  influence  or 
command  or  the  prospect  of  promotion  ;  nor  need  we 
doubt  that  cases  of  conversion  out  of  conviction  or 
temporary  enthusiasm  at  times  occurred.  A  writer 
who  takes  great  pains  to  give  chains  of  authorities 
for  even  trivial  incidents  records  how  a  Christian, 
whose  name  he  gives,  heard  a  pious  Moslem  at  night 
reciting  the  text  of  the  Koran  wherein  it  is  asserted 
that  all  who  are  in  heaven  and  earth  offer  Islam  to 
God ;  the  words  thrilled  the  hearer  so  powerfully 
that  he  fainted,  and  presently  came  to  be  admitted 
into  the  Moslem  fold.^  We  read  of  a  bookseller  who 
adopted  Islam  because  he  found  that  the  copies  of 
their  sacred  books  made  by  Jews  and  Christians  were 
careless  and  contained  many  various  readings,  whereas 
those  made  by  Moslems  were  absolutely  identical  and 
scrupulously  correct.  At  times  Jews  or  Christians 
who  wished  to  pursue  studies  qualifying  them  for  the 
medical  profession  joined  Islam  because  the  leading 
teacher  happened  to  be  a  Moslem  and  declined  to 
admit  any  but  co-religionists  to  his  courses. 

Since  in  all  these  cases  the  motive  could  only  work 

1  Masari^  al-^Usshak  144. 


134    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

one  way,  i.e,  in  the  direction  of  bringing  proselytes 
over  to  Islam,  whereas  no  proselytism  could  take 
place  in  the  opposite  direction,  it  is  a  marvel  to  all 
who  have  considered  Eastern  Christianity  and  its 
circumstances  since  the  Islamic  conquests  that  it 
should  have  survived  at  all ;  and  the  experimental 
study  of  religion  is  compelled  to  acknowledge  and 
encouraged  to  find  reasons  for  this  vitality  which  is 
in  such  striking  contrast  to  the  weakness  of  classical 
paganism,  to  which  there  was  said  Die !  and  it  died. 


\ 


LECTURE   V 

THE    DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDAN   ETHICS 

Although  the  Moslems  were  frequently  invited  to 
sacrifice  life  and  goods  in  the  cause  of  their  religion, 
asceticism  is  scarcely  a  Koranic  aspiration ;  since  its 
Paradise  offers  among  other  delights  pure  water, 
clarified  honey,  milk  that  has  not  turned  sour,  and 
wine  that  is  a  pleasure  to  drink,  administered  by  fair 
cupbearers,^  it  evidently  does  not  despise  these  good 
things ;  and  there  are  texts  showing  a  proper  appre- 
ciation for  all  forms  of  wealth,  including  jewellery 
and  fine  clothes,  which  indeed  are  to  form  part  of  the 
joys  of  Paradise,  where  the  blest  are  to  wear  silk 
garments  and  be  adorned  with  gold  bracelets  and 
pearls.^  Hence,  when  in  the  Prophet's  biography  we 
find  persons  of  acknowledged  sanctity  anxious  to 
possess  themselves  of  such  treasures,  and  disputes 
arising  over  the  allotment  of  booty,  there  was  nothing 
in  such  conduct  at  all  contrary  to  the  Moslems'  pro- 
fession. And  this  appreciation  of  the  value  of  wealth 
rendered  the  mission  far  less  disastrous  than  it  might 
otherwise  have  been ;  the  wanton  destructiveness 
which  often  accompanies  such  enterprises  was  kept 

1  xxxvii.  43;  xlvii.  17.  ^  xxxv.  34;  xliv.  33. 

135 


136    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

in  check.  It  is  highly  creditable  to  the  Prophet 
himself  that  he  devised  a  system  whereby  the 
Moslems  should  be  able  to  live  by  a  tax  on  other 
communities,  whom  therefore  they  would  have  an 
interest  in  preserving.  And  it  was  afterwards  found 
that  his  practice  in  the  matter  of  destroying  the 
property  of  enemies  was  regulated  by  economical 
doctrine.  Where  he  felt  sure  of  ultimate  victory, 
he  spared  the  property  as  much  as  possible,  since 
it  would  ultimately  become  the  possession  of  the 
Moslems,  its  owners  being  either  slaughtered  or 
enslaved ;  the  latter  name  being  employed  in  this 
context  of  the  tolerated  communities.  The  later 
legislation  therefore  recommended  the  same  course 
where  there  was  a  reasonable  prospect  of  success.^ 

The  Companions  of  the  Prophet,  then,  for  the 
most  part  amassed  wealth,  and  the  transformation  of 
Meccah  and  Medinah  from  obscure  settlements  into 
the  religious  and  political  capitals  of  a  mighty  empire 
was  sufficient  of  itself  to  enrich  those  who  possessed 
land  or  houses  in  either,  owing  to  what  is  now  called 
unearned  increment.  A  Meccan  house  which  had 
been  purchased  in  pagan  days  for  a  skin  of  wine  was 
afterwards  sold  for  60,000  dirhems — and  this  was  far 
below  its  value.^  The  value  of  the  estates  possessed 
by  the  Prophet's  cousin  Zubair  was  found  to  be 
50,200,000  dirhems,^  and  fabulous  figures  are  quoted 
for  other  Companions  of  the  Prophet.^  Huge 
fortunes   were   built   up  out  of  the  plunder   which 

1  Shafi%  Umm  vii.  324.  2  Jahiz,  Bayan  ii.  108. 

3  Bokhari,  ed.  Krehl,  ii.  281.  ^  Jamharat  al-Amthal  58. 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDAN   ETHICS     137 

reached  Medinah  in  camel-loads  from  Persia,  Syria, 
and  Egypt.  We  are  told,  and  may  well  believe, 
that  the  Arabs  had  at  first  little  knowledge  of  the 
value  attaching  to  the  objects  which  they  looted  so 
easily ;  but  better  knowledge  was  speedily  acquired, 
and  the  mere  size  of  the  establishments  maintained 
by  the  Islamic  heroes  indicates  the  magnitude  of  the 
fortunes  which  they  amassed.  In  the  year  68  we 
read  of  a  noble  Moslem  possessing  a  thousand  slaves  ;^ 
and  a  son  of  the  pious  Omar,  himself  reverenced  for 
his  sanctity,  manumitted  the  same  number^  before 
his  death. 

Among  the  persons  with  whom  the  Prophet  had 
from  the  first  to  deal  were  those  who  had  no  aspira- 
tion after  wealthy  respectability,  or  who  at  least  were 
not  satisfied  with  this  ideal.  Their  voices  were 
silenced  for  the  most  part  during  the  Prophet's 
lifetime,  after  his  role  of  world-conqueror  had  begun, 
and  during  the  stormy  times  which  preceded  the 
establishment  of  the  Umayyad  dynasty  they  could 
not  easily  make  themselves  heard.  The  distinction 
that  is  sometimes  drawn  by  Islamic  writers  between 
the  various  dynasties  as  respectively  spiritual  and 
temporal,  religious  and  worldly,  had  no  existence  in 
fact ;  no  empire  can  be  anything  other  than  worldly ; 
the  pious  Caliphs  were  as  anxious  about  the  revenue 
as  were  the  impious  ;  the  practice  of  assigning  annual 
pensions  to  the  Moslems  in  order  of  enrolment  was 
introduced  by  the  second  Caliph,  and  would  doubtless 
have  been  approved  by  the  Prophet.     The  Prophet's 

1  Tabari  ii.  789.  2  Jbn  Khallikan. 


138    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

cousin,  celebrated  on  the  one  hand  as  the  "inter- 
preter of  the  Koran,"  and  on  the  other  as  the  ancestor 
of  the  Abbasid  sovereigns,  ^Abdallah  Ibn  'Abbas, 
when  compelled  to  quit  his  governorship  of  Basrah, 
secured  for  himself  the  public  treasure.  The  Prophet's 
grandson,  Hasan,  son  of  Ali  and  Fatimah,  and  one 
of  the  personages  held  in  highest  reverence  by  both 
the  chief  Islamic  sects,  sold  his  claims  to  the  sovereignty 
for  a  handsome  sum.  The  unpopularity  of  the  third 
Caliph,  who,  however,  as  the  husband  of  two  of  the 
Prophet's  daughters,  was  one  of  the  most  highly 
esteemed  among  the  Moslems,  and  from  an  early 
time  was  called  the  possessor  of  the  two  lights,  was 
said  to  be  due  to  his  unduly  distributing  the  public 
treasure  among  his  relations. 

The  tradition  makes  the  Meccan  precursors  of 
Mohammed  ascetics,  and  suggests  that  many  of  his 
followers  would  have  been  better  pleased  had  he 
established  a  more  definitely  ascetic  system.  Doubt- 
less, then,  such  concessions  as  he  made  to  this  taste 
were  welcome  to  many  of  his  followers,  and  certain 
prohibitions  which  apply  to  all  Moslems  are  evidently 
ascetic  in  character.  The  most  notable  among  pro- 
hibited enjoyments  are  those  of  wine  and  sport. 
The  sentiment,  especially  among  the  humbler 
Moslems,  on  these  subjects  appears  to  have  been 
regularly  in  favour  of  strictness,  and  though  the 
Umayyad  sovereigns  are  frequently  represented  by 
their  successors  as  evil-livers,  a  fair  number  among 
them  were  against  any  sort  of  laxity,  while  those 
who   were   lax   thereby   rendered   their   thrones   in- 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDAN   ETHICS     139 

secure.  The  fact  of  a  Moslem  being  given  wine  in 
lieu  of  vinegar  by  a  shopman,  who  then  declined  to 
refund  the  money,  led  to  a  revolt  in  the  year  119.^ 
Still,  when  the  world  has  been  found  worth  winning, 
it  is  usually  found  worth  enjoying,  and  the  fortunes 
amassed  by  those  who  took  part  in  the  successful 
wars  with  Unbelievers  were  ordinarily  consumed  in 
the  enjoyment  of  luxuries  of  various  sorts,  though 
the  pleasures  particularly  forbidden  may  have  often 
been  avoided.  The  third  Caliph,  according  to  the 
chronicle,  confessed  his  inability  to  emulate  the 
coarse  diet  maintained  by  .  his  two  predecessors, 
even  when  mounted  on  the  throne.  And  the  first 
Umayyad  Caliph  is  represented  as  stating  like 
Solomon  that  he  had  enjoyed  all  that  it  w^as  possible 
to  enjoy. 

A  class  of  persons  called  variously  "ascetics^" 
"  devotees,"  "  worshippers,"  "  saintly  men,"  is  the  sub- 
ject of  occasional  allusions  in  the  history  of  the  first 
two  dynasties.  In  some  dying  injunctions  of  the  year 
82  A.H.,  "the  ethics  of  the  saintly"  is  recommended 
as  a  subject  of  study. ^  An  example  of  the  proper 
conduct  for  such  persons  is  given  in  the  chronicle 
for  the  year  98  ;  ^  a  priceless  crown  has  been  taken 
in  some  plunder,  and  it  occurs  to  the  conqueror  to 
try  whether  anyone  would  refuse  such  a  gift.  A 
certain  saint  is  offered  it  and  declines ;  it  is  forced 
upon  his  acceptance,  and  he  then  presents  it  to  a 
beggar,  from  whom  the  commander  reacquires  it 
for  a  vast  sum.     Persons  of  saintly  reputation  are 

1  Tabariii.  l622.  2  /^^'^^  joSS.  ^  m^,^  1326. 


140    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

occasionally  employed  in  minor  political  roles ;  e.g, 
as  messengers  to  induce  subject  kings  to  pay  their 
tribute ;  ^  as  arbiters  in  the  case  of  disputes  between 
commanders ;  ^'  or  as  preachers  dissuading  the  Mos- 
lems from  factiousness.^  At  times  their  studies  end 
in  their  rebelling  against  the  powers  that  be,*  or 
supporting  some  pretender  who  will  undertake  to 
live  up  to  their  standard.  The  first  use  of  wool  in 
connection  with  them  appears  to  be  in  the  year  128, 
when  one  of  these  fighting  ascetics  has  some  of  that 
material  on  his  standards/  Woollen  garments,  how- 
ever, not  unfrequently  figure  in  narratives  of  this 
period,  as  the  dress  of  condemned  criminals,^  or  of 
beggars."^  The  colour  white,  as  the  colour  of  grave- 
clothes,  is  also  at  this  time  connected  with  mourning 
and  asceticism.^  By  a  man's  coarse  white  raiment 
it  was  possible  to  guess  that  he  was  an  ascetic,^ 
though  he  might  be  either  a  Moslem  ascetic  or  a 
Christian  monk ;  and,  indeed,  this  costume  of  white 
wool  is  identified  sometimes  with  the  attire  of  monks, 
who  were  supposed  by  an  early  Moslem  observer  to 
put  it  on  in  order  to  impress  their  fellows  with  the 
idea  of  their  saintliness,  and  so  obtain  the  right  to 
live  in  idleness  at  other  people's  expense.^^     There 

1  Tabarlii.  1228.  2  [j^i^ ^  1335 

3  Ihid.,  1392.  4  Ihid.,  1628. 

^  Ibid.,  1921.  6  iiyi^^  1452. 

'   Ibid.,  1351.  8  lUd.^  162;  Yakut,  Udaba  vi.  375. 

9  Mas'iidl,  Muruj  ii.  231. 

1^  Jaliiz,  Hayawan  i.  103  ;  iv.  137.  At  a  later  time  the  white  is 
distinguished  from  the  wool  as  a  different  degree  of  mourning, 
Ibn  lyas  iii.  20. 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDAN   ETHICS     141 

can  be  little  doubt,  then,  that  the  name  Sufi  means 
no  more  than  "  wearer  of  wool,"  and,  indeed,  a  poet 
who  perhaps  does  not  yet  know  of  it  as  a  technical 
name  for  ascetic  speaks  of  "time  having  put  on 
wool,"  meaning  that  it  has  put  on  mourning.^ 

In  the  early  part  of  the  third  century  it  appears 
that  the  Moslem  ascetic  was  not  easily  distinguished 
from  the  Christian  ;  and,  indeed,  they  had  much  in 
common.  Their  ancestor  in  the  Grseco-Roman  world 
was  the  Cynic,  who  in  the  analysis  of  Epictetus  is 
the  Stoic  who  carries  his  principles  to  their  logical 
conclusion,  and  who,  in  order  that  he  may  be  able 
to  defy  fortune,  gives  fortune  no  pledges.  The  Cynic 
in  that  briUiant  description  addresses  mankind  from 
a  higher  plane  than  theirs,  for  he  is  free  from  all  their 
cares  and  passions.  His  business  requires  qualifica- 
tions no  less  remarkable  and  rare  than  those  of  the 
general  or  the  steward. 

Where  life  was  lived  so  much  in  public,  any  devia- 
tion from  ordinary  conduct  was  liable  to  be  sus- 
pected and  to  provoke  resentment.  In  the  year  33 
a  man  was  summoned  to  appear  before  the  Caliph 
on  the  ground  that  he  was  a  vegetarian,  disapproved 
of  marriage,  and  failed  to  attend  the  Friday  service 
in  the  mosque.^  Vegetarianism  might  seem  a  harm- 
less enough  practice,  but  it  was  associated  with  the 
name  of  one  Mazdak,  who  in  the  century  preceding 
the  rise  of  Islam  was  supposed  to  have  shaken  Persian 
society    to    its    foundations.       In    the    Wisdom    of 

1  Abu  Tamniam ;  ridiculed  by  Mutanabbi,  Yakut  vi.  514. 

2  Tabari  i.  2924 


I 

142   EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

Solomon  the  "just  man  "is  charged  by  the  others 
with  following  a  different  line  of  conduct  from  theirs. 
And,  in  fact,  it  would  appear  to  be  the  case  that 
ostentatious  piety  was  often  the  sign  of  anarchical 
tendencies  and  the  prelude  to  revolt.  Religion  in 
the  first  century  after  the  Prophet's  death  was  so 
closely  connected  with  politics  that  the  earnest  Moslem 
was  compelled  to  take  a  political  line ;  and  that  line 
would  be  dictated  by  his  attitude  towards  those  who 
had  started  and  taken  part  in  the  civil  wars.  The 
greatest  devotees  appear  to  have  regularly  been 
against  both  the  Umayyads  and  the  party  which 
recognised  the  right  of  the  Prophet's  family  to  suc- 
ceed ;  their  devotion  was  accompanied  by  a  ruthless- 
ness  which  shocked  their  less  religious  contemporaries. 
Still,  it  is  clear  that  there  were  pious  men  who  kept 
out  of  the  world  altogether,  and  were  in  favour  of 
nothing  but  peace  and  order,  so  far  as  they  occupied 
themselves  with  the  affairs  of  their  time  at  all.  The 
"  conduct  of  the  pious,"  which,  as  we  have  seen, 
developed  into  a  subject  of  study  by  the  year  82, 
was  then  elaborated  by  these  persons,  who  in  the 
main  exaggerated  or  amplified  what  they  found  re- 
commended in  the  Koran. 

For  the  Umayyad  period  we  possess  few  documents 
which  testify  to  these  persons'  activity,  but  in  the 
Abbasid  period  the  ascetic  becomes  an  institution. 
In  part  he  attracts  attention  by  his  attitude  towards 
the  world,  wherein  he  is  without  being  of  it ;  the 
prizes  for  which  others  contend  have  no  attraction 
for  him.     But  he  is  also  the  preacher  whose  words 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDAN   ETHICS     143  i 

i 
have  the  power  to  produce  ecstasy,  or  at  least  elevate  ! 

the  hearer.  ; 

Of  the  first  of  these  preachers  who  also  figured  as 
an  author  we  possess  several  works  in  MS.  They 
seem  to  follow  the  lines  of  the  Christian  sermon,  to  j 

the  extent  even  of  reproducing  matter  from  the  New  ' 

Testament ;  they  are  fervent,  and  their  moral  tone  is  , 

high ;   yet  it  is  difficult  to  imagine  their   producing  ; 

that  ecstasy  among  their  audience  with  which  they  ] 

are  credited.     They  seem  quite  free  from  the  elabor-  ; 

ate  technicalities  with  which  the  later  Siifi  treatises 
abound.  j 

A  certain  amount  of  licence  is  ordinarily  allowed  | 

the   preacher   in   his   treatment    of  history,   for   his  j 

lessons  must  be  enforced  by  references  to  patterns  of  j 

conduct,  whence  the  tendency  arises  to  accommodate  ' 

history   to   his   ideals.       As   one   of  the   later   Sufis  | 

expresses  it,  the  authority  of  a  great  name  is  wanted  • 

for  something,  and  no  harm   seems  to  be  done  if  a  | 

man  is  credited  with  some  extra  virtues. 

The  use  in  these  homiletic  works  of  matter  taken  ; 

directly  from  Christian  sources  is  sufficiently  remark-  i 

able   to  justify  us  in   finding  Christian  influence  or  j 

the   survival   of  Christian   ideals  at  the  base  of  the  j 

movement.      Sometimes   the   matter   is   taken   over  i 

bodily ;   thus  the  Parable  of  the  Sower  is  told   by  j 

the  earliest  Sufi  writer.     Abu  Talib  takes  over  the  ! 

dialogue   in    the    Gospel    eschatology   between    the  ' 

Saviour  and  those  who  are  taunted  with  having  seen 
Him  hungry  and  refused  Him  food ;  only  for  the 
questioner  he  substitutes  Allah,  and  for  "  the  least  of  j 


144   EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

these  "  his  Moslem  brother.  Not  a  few  of  the  Beati- 
tudes are  taken  over,  sometimes  with  the  name  of 
their  author.  Commonplaces  which  are  found  in 
Christian  homiletic  works  reappear  with  little  or  no 
alteration  in  the  Sufi  sermons.  In  the  Acts  of 
Thomas,  the  Apostle,  when  employed  by  a  king  to 
build  a  palace,  spends  the  money  in  charity  to  the 
poor.  Presently  the  king's  brother  dies,  and  finds 
that  a  wonderful  palace  has  been  built  for  the  king  in 
Paradise  with  the  alms  which  Thomas  bestowed  in 
his  name.  This  story  reappears  in  the  doctrine  of 
Abu  Talib  that  when  a  poor  man  takes  charity  from 
the  wealthy,  he  is  thereby  building  him  a  house  in 
Paradise.^ 

One  name  which  Sufism  takes  over  from  Christian 
theorists  is  gnosis.  As  early  as  the  Epistles  of  St 
Paul  we  read  of  a  "  wisdom "  or  esoteric  doctrine 
which  is  only  communicated  to  those  that  are 
advanced  spiritually ;  and  we  know  that  in  later 
times  at  any  rate  that  gnosis  was  something  very 
different  from  ordinary  orthodoxy.  This  same  word 
"  knowledge "  is  also  employed  by  the  Sufis  as  a 
technical  description  of  their  system,  and  indeed  as 
the  substitute  which  God  has  given  them  for  the 
world.^  In  the  later  developments  "  knowledge " 
branches  out  into  three  forms,  which  we  might 
render  "  knowledge,"  "  acquaintance,"  and  "  under- 
standing." The  third  is  the  highest  stage,  and  the 
person  who  attains  to  it  is  all  but  deified. 

Here,  however,  as  in  the  case  of  jurisprudence,  the 

1  K.  K.  ii.  201.  2  iiyi^^  ii.  193 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDAN   ETHICS     145 

amount  taken  over  from  earlier  communities  does 
not  appear  to  have  been  considerable.  It  would 
seem  fairly  clear  that  the  ascetic  is  an  early  institution 
in  the  East ;  and  even  in  the  West  there  is  a  lurking 
feeling  of  respect  for  the  man  who  is  above  caring 
for  what  constitute  the  object  of  ordinary  aspirations. 
When  once  men  begin  to  speculate  upon  this  instinct, 
the  system  necessarily  goes  through  a  number  of 
stages  —  not  unlike  the  stages  which  the  ascetics 
claim  to  go  through  individually.  It  is  difficult  to 
maintain  that  present  fortune  may  be  prudently 
resigned  for  a  future  of  the  same  kind ;  hence  the 
ascetic  quickly  becomes  dissatisfied  with  a  sensual 
Paradise.  The  search  after  a  substitute  for  that 
Paradise  leads  on  to  the  next  stage,  the  doctrine  of 
the  love  of  God  and  nirvana.  Probably  ideas  originally 
taken  from  Plato  had  somehow  found  their  way 
into  these  men's  minds,  just  as  Aristotelianism  is 
traceable  in  the  Koran ;  but  the  influence  is  very 
indirect  and  has  come  tortuously. 

That  volume  not  unjustly  calls  attention  to  its 
miscellaneous  character,  and  though  it  by  no  means 
despises  the  acquisition  of  spoil  in  this  world,  and 
condemns  lavish  expenditure,  whilst  promising  the 
faithful  in  Paradise  delights  greater  in  quantity  but 
not  differing  in  quality  from  what  they  might  enjoy 
down  here,  still  it  occasionally  takes  a  line  more  in 
accordance  with  ascetic  spiritualism ;  it  pronounces 
the  favour  of  God  to  be  a  better  thing  than  talents  of 
gold  and  the  like.  Moreover,  the  theory  of  atone- 
ment at  any  rate  gives  some  hints  as  to  the  sort  of 

10 


146    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

acts  which  win   God's   favour;    if  offences   can  be 

atoned  by  charity  or  fasting,  it  is  clear  that  these  acts 

must  possess   positive  value ;    otherwise  they  could 

not   serve   as    makeweights    against    such   negative 

quantities  as  sins.     And  there  is  a  tendency  to  extend 

the  theory  of  atonement  to  all  religious  observances  ; 

since  God  does  nothing  in  vain,  the  purpose  of  these 

performances  must  be  to  atone  for  acts  committed 

wittingly  or  unwittingly  which  have  incurred  God's 

displeasure.      The  first   line  wherein  asceticism  can 

develop  is,  then,  that  of  supererogation  :  doing  what 

the  Koran  prescribes  to  a  more  liberal  extent  than  it 

actually  enjoins.     And  so  far  as  Islamic  asceticism  is 

expressed  in  practice,  it  regularly  adopts  this  method. 

It  wins  merit  by  excessive  performance  of  those  acts 

which  on  the  authority  of  the  Koran  are  known  to 

win  it. 

The  work  from  which  the  details  to  be  given  in 
this  lecture  are  mainly  taken  is  of  the  fourth  century 
of  Islam,  by  which  time  asceticism  had  long  been 
recognised  as  an  institution  with  many  provincial 
varieties.  Possibly  the  earliest  place  with  which  it 
is  connected  is  Kufah,  the  city  which  showed  so 
infehcitous  a  devotion  to  the  Prophet's  family.  The 
"  conduct  of  the  saints,"  which,  as  has  been  seen,  had 
become  a  recognised  subject  of  study  before  the  end 
of  the  first  century,  had  by  the  fourth  acquired  con- 
siderable proportions  ;  fairly  copious  hagiologies  had 
by  that  time  been  amassed,  and  numerous  sayings  of 
an  edifying  nature  either  recorded  of  or  attributed  to 
the  saints.     The  question  of  the  accuracy  of  these 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDAN   ETHICS     147 

legends  is  of  little  importance ;  what  they  indicate  is 
the  general  notion  of  sanctity  current,  and  what 
view  of  life  a  saint  was  expected  to  take.  Although, 
then,  we  have  ordinarily  restricted  ourselves  to 
authorities  who  are  not  later  than  the  third  century, 
in  this  particular  matter  we  are  not  likely  to  be  led 
into  serious  error  by  employing  a  work  of  the  fourth. 
As  earlier  sources  of  information  become  open  to  us, 
we  constantly  find  the  doctrines  and  the  statements 
which  are  to  be  found  in  the  later  works  anticipated ; 
even  the  astounding  perversions  of  the  Koran  which 
are  usually  associated  with  the  mysticism  of  the  sixth 
century  are  to  be  found  with  little  divergence  in  the 
mysticism  of  the  third.  The  mystics  are  not  only 
like  the  jurists  conservative,  but  show  a  tendency  to 
preserve  theories  and  practices  which  are  immemorial, 
and  which  have  accidentally  adopted  Islam  as  their 
local  attire. 

The  five  daily  salawat  might  be  thought  to 
constitute  a  considerable  devotional  exercise,  since 
each  of  them  occupies  some  minutes.  How  they 
came  to  assume  their  stereotyped  form  will  never  be 
known;  it  is  clear  that  their  purpose  is  rather 
"  making  mention  of  God,"  and  keeping  the  mind  in 
constant  recollection  of  the  Divine  Being,  than  peti- 
tion or  supplication.  To  the  devout  these  five  daily 
exercises  did  not  nearly  suffice ;  their  aim  was  rather 
to  occupy  the  whole  day  and  night  with  devotion  of 
the  kind,  and  numerous  different  rites  were  devised 
compassing  this  end.  Traditions  were  invented 
promising  greater  and  ever  greater  rewards  to  those 


148    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

who  practised  these  extra  devotions  ;  their  spurious- 
ness  was  evident,  and  probably  httle  importance  was 
attached  to  them. 

The  extra  devotions  invented  by  the  ascetics  and 
mystics  introduced  into  Islam  something  far  more 
analogous  to  the  prayers  of  other  religions  than  the 
salat.  Abu  Tiilib  al-Mekki  prescribes  forms  for  use 
on  lying  down  and  rising  which  do  not  differ  materially 
from  the  prayers  recommended  in  Christian  manuals 
of  devotion ;  what  is  solicited  is  preservation  from 
the  dangers  of  the  day  and  of  the  night.  But  with 
the  limitation  of  human  desires  which  the  ascetic 
system  compasses,  the  number  of  possible  requests  is 
naturally  reduced.  The  discipline  which  frees  the 
mind  from  worldly  desire  very  soon  liberates  it  from 
all  desires  for  the  next  world  also :  the  prospect  of 
Hell-fire  itself,  from  which  religion  at  the  start 
promises  immunity,  comes  to  be  contemplated  with 
indifference ;  hence  even  these  prayers  tend  to 
become  confessions  rather  than  supplications,  and 
the  blessings  which  they  procure  become  immaterial 
— immunity  from  forgetting  the  text  of  the  Koran  or 
sleeping  when  the  saint  should  be  vigilant. 

In  the  matter  of  the  saldt  or  regular  devotion  en- 
joined by  the  code,  the  Sufis  endeavour  to  spiritualise 
the  ceremony  by  making  it  an  occasion  for  complete 
abstraction  from  the  world.  Some  saints  could  boast 
that  for  forty  years  they  had  said  their  devotions 
without  knowing  who  was  on  their  right  side  or  on 
their  left.  Salat  was  rendered  void  if  the  mind  of 
the  devotee  admitted  any  thought  besides  :  if,  e.g.. 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDAN   ETHICS     149 

he  read  anything  written  on  wall  or  carpet.  The 
formulae  should  not  be  pronounced  as  such,  but  out 
of  conviction  :  when  a  man  says  "  Allah  is  greater,"  he 
should,  tacitly  indeed,  but  because  he  is  convinced  of 
its  truth,  add  "  than  the  great."  But  in  order  to  say 
this  he  must  in  his  own  mind  subordinate  all  else  to 
God  ;  for  otherwise  he  will  be  saying  what  he  does 
not  mean.  There  were  saints  who  when  they  started 
their  salat  told  their  women-folk  that  they  might 
chatter  as  much  as  they  liked  and  even  beat  drums : 
they  were  too  much  absorbed  in  prayer  to  hear,  how- 
ever loud  the  noise.  When  one  of  them  was  saying 
his  salat  in  the  mosque  of  Basrah  a  column  fell, 
bringing  down  with  it  an  erection  of  four  storeys ; 
he  continued  praying,  and  when  after  he  had  finished 
the  people  congratulated  him  on  his  escape,  he  asked 
what  from.  Great  names  were  quoted  for  the 
practice  of  praying  hastily,  and  so  shortening  the 
time  taken  by  the  devotion  as  to  give  Satan  no 
chance  of  distracting  the  thoughts. 

The  Islamic  Fast  is  an  obscure  subject,  as  it  seems 
to  belong  in  origin  to  some  system  with  which  we  are 
unfamiliar,  although  it  contains  Jewish  and  Christian 
elements  also.  With  the  Christians,  fasting  seems 
regularly  to  have  meant  not  complete  abstinence,  but 
abstinence  from  dainties ;  and,  indeed,  unless  fasting 
is  to  interfere  seriously  with  the  business  of  life,  this 
would  seem  to  be  the  best  interpretation  of  the 
process ;  food  is  retained  as  a  necessity,  but  the 
element  of  enjoyment  is  so  far  as  possible  abstracted. 
The  Jewish  theory  is  that   fasting  means  complete 


150    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

abstinence  from  food,  but  then  they  fast  for  one 
complete  day  only:  which  is  not  sufficient  to  per- 
manently injure  the  health.  The  Mohammedan 
theory  of  fasting  is  complete  abstinence,  but  only 
during  the  day  :  the  substitution  of  the  night  for  the 
day  as  the  feeding  time,  for  a  period  somewhat 
shorter  than  the  Christian  forty  days,  yet  during  a 
month  which  from  its  name  must  at  one  time  have 
been  part  of  the  hot  summer.  This  institution  clearly 
was  useful  as  military  discipline,  seeing  that  the  night 
was  the  best  time  for  forays ;  yet  it  is  not  quite  easy 
to  think  of  it  as  a  substitute  for  the  Jewish  fasts, 
although  the  text  of  the  Koran  expressly  asserts 
that  this  is  so.  What  the  Koranic  ordinance  has  in 
common  with  those  of  the  older  systems  is  the  pre- 
scription of  a  number  of  days  for  this  purpose ;  but 
the  reason  assigned  for  the  choice  of  Ramadan  is  that 
in  that  month  the  Koran  was  revealed — it  must  be 
supposed  was  revealed  for  the  first  time.  The 
connection  of  ideas  seems  to  be  this :  it  appears 
from  Deuteronomy  ix.  9  that  Moses  fasted  on  the 
mountain  forty  days  and  forty  nights,  and  at  the  end 
of  the  time  received  the  Law.  With  this  fast  of 
Moses  the  Christian  fast  of  forty  days  is  not  un- 
naturally confused ;  the  latter  is  supposed  to  be 
commemorative  of  the  former.  From  the  text  of 
Surah  ii.,  then,  we  learn  that  the  Moslem  fast  is 
similarly  commemorative  of  the  descent  of  the  Koran, 
which  the  tradition  connects  with  a  similar  period  of 
asceticism  ;  this  the  Koran  does  not  assert,  though 
it  perhaps  implies  it ;  and  in  Surah  vii.  138  we  see 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDAN   ETHICS     151 

how  the  number  forty  is  reduced  to  a  month.  The 
original  appointment  with  Moses  was  for  thirty  days  ; 
these  "  we  supplemented  with  ten,  so  that  the 
appointment  with  his  Lord  was  made  up  to  forty 
days."  The  forty  days,  then,  represented  an  increase 
on  an  original  thirty,  or  one  whole  month.  And  to 
this  month  the  Koranic  legislation  returns.  How 
the  particular  mode  of  fasting  originated  it  might  be 
hard  to  conjecture. 

Fasting  was  regarded  by  the  Sufis  not  only  as 
a  devotional  exercise,  but  as  a  pious  act  pleasing  to 
God,  whence  on  the  one  hand  it  is  assigned  propitia- 
tory value  in  the  Koran  itself,  whilst  on  the  other 
the  devout  were  by  no  means  satisfied  with  a  fast 
of  thirty  days  in  the  whole  year;  they  endeavour 
to  extend  the  limits.  Monday  and  Thursday  in  each 
week  are  prescribed  as  fast  days,  wherein  perhaps  we 
see  the  principle  of  antedating  the  Christian  fasts, 
somewhat  as  the  Friday  anticipates  the  Sabbath  and 
the  Sunday.  Calculations  came  to  be  made  of  the 
amount  of  the  year  which  it  was  desirable  to  fast, 
and  some  care  had  to  be  exercised  to  see  that  the 
special  glories  of  Ramadan  were  not  obscured,  as 
would  be  the  case  if  similar  sanctity  attached  to  the 
whole  year.  Fasting  every  other  day,  fasting  two 
days  out  of  three,  fasting  one  day  out  of  three,  were 
all  commended  practices.  Nevertheless,  the  doctrine 
is  sometimes  heard  that  the  true  fasting  is  abstinence 
from  the  gratification  of  evil  passions,  and  that  the 
fasting  of  the  heart  is  a  more  important  matter  than 
the  fasting  of  the  frame. 


152    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

It  seems  clear  that  fasting  in  the  Sufi  sense 
means  something  different  from  the  normal  fasting 
of  Ramadan,  and  has  nothing  to  do  with  the  substi- 
tution of  night  for  day  as  the  meal-time.  It  means 
abstinence  from  food  of  all  sorts.  Help  towards 
fasting  was  got  from  the  Sfifi  melodies ;  when  these 
were  sung  they  reminded  the  devotee  of  his  spiritual 
needs  and  caused  him  to  forget  the  pangs  of  hunger. 

But  besides  this,  some  methods  could  be  suggested 
whereby  the  aspirant  could  accustom  himself  to  the 
minimum  of  nourishment  necessary  to  keep  body  and 
soul  together.  This  could  be  done  either  by  reducing 
the  amount  to  one-third  of  what  was  usual,  or  by 
increasing  the  number  of  hours  to  elapse  between 
meals.  One  meal  in  seventy-two  hours  was  thought 
to  be  in  ordinary  cases  the  attainable  limit.  The 
test  whether  food  was  taken  to  gratify  the  appetite 
or  merely  to  allay  the  pangs  of  hunger  might  be 
either  the  desire  for  bread  without  relish  of  any  sort, 
or  inability  to  distinguish  between  bread  and  other 
foods  ;  one  who  desired  a  particular  food,  and  not 
food  generically,  was  not  really  hungry.^  A  some- 
what less  savoury  test  was  to  see  whether  a  fly 
settled  on  the  saliva  ;  if  none  did,  the  aspirant  might 
be  satisfied  that  he  was  really  hungry. 

Cases  of  longer  abstinence  than  that  suggested 
Were  narrated  among  the  glories  of  various  saints. 
Fasts  of  five  or  six  days  were  not  uncommon ;  a 
vision  of  power  from  the  spiritual  world  would 
appear  to  one  who  fasted  forty  days  ;  a  Sufi  converted 

i  K.  K.  ii.  165. 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDAN   ETHICS     153 

a  Christian  monk  by  showing  that  he  could  fast  sixty 
days  successively,  and  so  beat  the  Biblical  records. 

Naturally  the  theory  of  fasting  was  extended  to 
vetoing  all  refinements  in  diet ;  the  coarser  the  food 
and  the  simpler,  the  better  it  corresponded  with  the 
Sufi  ideal.  Some  disapproved  of  the  chase  and  food 
so  acquired  because  of  the  cruelty  inflicted  on  the 
animals.^  The  change  of  raiment  which  the  asceticism 
of  the  gospel  condemned  was  also  tabooed  by  the 
Sufis.  The  hungering  and  thirsting  after  righteous- 
ness in  the  evangelical  beatitude  was  interpreted  of 
actual  hunger  and  thirst ;  and  similarly,  the  Prophet 
is  credited  with  the  saying,  "  Whoso  among  you  is 
most  filled  in  this  life  shall  fast  longest  on  the  Day 
of  Judgment."  Satan  is  said  to  follow  the  course  of 
the  blood  in  the  human  body ;  the  contraction  of  the 
veins  which  was  said  to  be  produced  by  fasting  would 
render  it  harder  for  him  to  get  about. 

To  a  certain  extent  the  Sufic  fasting  and  simplicity 
of  diet  was  based  on  medical  theory,  and  the  Prophet's 
supposed  prescription  of  one-third  the  usual  amount 
is  said  to  have  won  warm  eulogies  from  the  faculty. 
It  could  be  shown  that  the  temperature  of  the  stomach, 
i.e.,  as  Aristotle  had  taught,  the  proportion  between 
hot  and  cold,  dry  and  moist,  was  least  disturbed  by 
water,  wheaten  bread,  partridge  meat,  and  pome- 
granate or  citron.  And,  indeed,  according  to  Moslem 
authorities  the  cosmogony  of  the  Old  Testament  con- 
tained not  only  the  four  Aristotelian  elements,  but  the 
doctrine  of  the  four  humours  of  the  body  besides.^ 

1  Hayawan  iv.  137.  ^  k   K.  ii.  170. 


154    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

The  Aristotelian  philosophy  could  be  employed 
in  defence  of  the  fasting-doctrine  in  another  way. 
Wahb  Ibn  Munabbih,  who  is  responsible  for  the  last 
quotation  from  the  Torah,  observed  that  the  stomach 
was  the  mean  in  the  body ;  and  the  secret  of  doing 
right  lay  in  getting  hold  of  the  mean.  He,  therefore, 
who  had  his  stomach  in  full  control  was  also  in 
control  of  his  other  members.  But  if  the  stomach 
was  allowed  to  get  the  upper  hand,  the  result  was  a 
general  mutiny  among  them. 

Edifying  stories  connected  with  fasting  are  collected 
by  Abu  Talib,  some  of  which  have  their  interest.  A 
Sufi  desired  rice-bread  and  fish  for  twenty  years,  but 
each  time  he  felt  the  desire  he  resisted  it.  After 
death  he  appeared  to  a  friend  in  a  dream.  The 
delights  of  Paradise  were  ineffable,  he  said ;  im- 
mediately on  his  arrival  he  had  been  served  with  rice- 
bread  and  fish.  The  Prophet  appeared  in  a  dream 
to  a  man  who  had  fasted  thirty  years ;  not  even 
eating  bread.  The  Prophet  seized  his  arm,  and 
exclaimed :  Hast  thou  fasted  thus  ?  As  he  did  not 
tell  the  ascetic  to  stop  fasting,  the  latter  continued 
his  mode  of  life.  'Utbah  asked  'Abd  al- Wahid  Ibn 
Zaid  why  a  fellow-devotee  had  attained  a  stage  of 
spiritual  elevation  higher  than  his  own :  he  was  told 
that  it  was  by  not  eating  dates.  If  he  too  left  off 
eating  them,  he  would  attain  to  the  same  level. 
'Utbah  shed  tears  when  told  of  this ;  which  the 
teacher  excused  on  the  ground  that  if  'Utbah  once 
resolved  to  break  with  a  habit,  he  could  be  counted 
upon  never  to  resume  it. 


DEVELOPJMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDAN   ETHICS     155 

Grantinof  that  food  must  at  certain  times  be  taken — 
and  there  were  ascetics  who  even  feasted  on  certain 
occasions—the  number  of  points  to  be  observed  in 
connection  therewith  is  no  fewer  than  one  hundred 
and  seventy  ;  ^  whence  it  may  be  doubted  whether 
Islam  is,  after  all,  so  simple  as  has  been  thought. 
Many  of  these  points  would  seem  to  belong  to 
elementary  etiquette,  or  at  best  to  fashion ;  yet  the 
pious  Umayyad  Omar  II.  thought  some  of  them 
sufficiently  important  to  be  regulated  by  rescripts. 

To  the  employment  of  hunger  as  a  means  of  grace 
must  be  added  the  employment  of  illness.     Even  in 
Plato,  who  as  a  Greek  favoured  the  development  of 
physical  strength  and  beauty,  we  find  the  suggestion 
that  men  are  at  times  led  to  become  philosophers 
by  illness;    and  since  the  holy  war  cannot  well  be 
carried  on  exeept  by  men  in  full  physical  vigour,  we 
fancy  the  Prophet  would  have  absolutely  rejected  the 
doctrine   that  ill-health   should  be   cultivated.     The 
Sufis,  however,  who  thought  only  of  spiritual  warfare, 
naturally  perceived  that  Satan,  in  the  sense  of  the 
lusts  of  the  eye  and  flesh  and  the  pride  of  life,  could  be 
defeated  with  greater  ease  by  the  sickly  than  by  the 
strong.     What  tempted    Pharaoh   to  claim  divinity 
was  the  fact  that  he  had  lived  four  hundred   years 
without  suffering  fever  or  headache.     Further,  sick- 
ness  has   propitiatory   value :    a   day's   fever   atones 
for  a  year's   misdeeds.     Health,  then,  to   the   Sufis 
signifies  mental  or  spiritual  health  ;  a  man  is  in  good 
health  when  he  is  free  from  transgression.     The  loss 

1  K.  K.  ii.  179. 


156    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

of  any  member  or  faculty  took  away  the  possibility 
of  transgressing  ;  whence  some  of  the  Companions  of 
the  Prophet  were  credited  with  desiring  to  be  blind. 
Although  the  Prophet  was  an  authority  on  medicine 
as  on  other  subjects,  the  morality  of  employing 
curatives  was  questioned  ;  for  there  was  the  danger 
that  the  effect  apparently  produced  by  the  drug 
might  be  ascribed  to  the  drug,  and  the  patient  or 
physician  become  in  his  secret  thoughts  a  polytheist 
— recognising  some  power  other  than  God  in  the 
world.  On  the  other  hand,  it  was  clear  that  the 
postures  to  be  adopted  in  the  daily  devotion  required 
that  the  body  should  be  in  a  condition  of  vigour : 
one  saint,  therefore,  who  was  paralysed  obtained  by 
prayer  the  use  of  his  limbs  for  those  daily  devotions : 
so  soon  as  they  were  over  he  became  bedridden  as 
before. 

Still  deeper  meanings  were  found  in  illness.  Sahl 
refused  to  treat  himself  for  a  malady  which  he  cured 
in  others,  because  a  blow  from  the  beloved  did  not 
pain.  The  saint's  consciousness  of  God  was  clearest 
when  he  was  in  fever. 

Just  as  speculation  on  the  meaning  and  purpose 
of  fasting  led  to  "perpetual  fasting,"  for  if  fasting 
were  a  virtuous  act,  there  was  no  reason  why  it 
should  be  reserved  for  a  particular  time  of  the  year, 
so  speculation  led  to  some  modification  of  the 
doctrine  of  the  pilgrimage.  In  the  case  of  this 
institution  we  have  a  difficulty  similar  to  that  of 
which  the  Pentateuch  gives  evidence :  where  a  feast 
is  held  within  or  in  the  immediate  neighbourhood  of 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDAN   ETHICS     157 

a  city  or  village,  it  is  possible  for  the  whole  com- 
munity to  join  in  the  celebration ;  for  an  occasional 
holiday  interferes  with  the  work  of  no  one,  and  even 
the  suspension  of  all  business  for  a  short  period 
is  possible.  But  where  the  feasting-place  is  at  a 
distance,  various  difficulties  come  in ;  since  few 
occupations  can  be  neglected  for  many  days  at  a 
time,  and  the  quitting  of  habitations  for  months 
together  by  the  whole  population  would  be  ruinous  ; 
a  yearly  pilgrimage  might  be  contemplated  by  a 
nomad  tribe,  but  would  be  impossible  in  the  case  of 
one  that  was  settled.  The  text  of  the  Koran  there- 
fore enjoins  the  pilgrimage  on  all  w^ho  can  take  part 
in  it  ;^  but  whereas  it  apparently  prescribes  pilgrimage 
not  once  in  a  lifetime,  but  every  year,  it  also  leaves 
it  open  to  the  Moslem  to  make  his  pilgrimage  in  one 
or  other  of  several  months,  and  leaves  it  to  him  to 
fix  the  time.  It  merely  enjoins  on  him  the  per- 
formance of  certain  ceremonies  and  abstinence  from 
certain  acts  during  the  time  in  which  he  chooses 
to  perform  the  rite.  The  old  employment  of  the 
pilgrimage  as  a  fair  or  meeting  for  the  exchange  of 
merchandise  is  permitted,  so  far  as  it  does  not 
interfere  with  these  prescriptions. 

The  Koranic  texts  are  obscure,  and  the  interpreters 
are  evidently  embarrassed  by  them ;  this,  however, 
appears  to  be  the  natural  sense.  The  extension  of 
the  Islamic  empire  to  distances  which  even  the 
Prophet  can  scarcely  have  contemplated  rendered 
the  annual  performance   of  the  rite   impossible   for 

1  iii.  91. 


158    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

many  members  of  the  commmiity,  and  exceedingly 
irksome  to  others  ;  hence  the  theory  that  it  should  be 
performed  once  at  least  in  a  lifetime.  Moreover,  the 
days  when  certain  special  ceremonies  were  usual 
apparently  came  to  be  thought  of  as  the  most 
important  part  of  the  feast;  hence  the  wide  limits 
permitted  in  the  Koran  were  restricted,  and  a 
distinction  was  made  between  the  minor  pilgrimage, 
of  which  the  time  was  fixed  by  the  devotee,  and  the 
major  pilgrimage,  of  which  the  time  was  fixed  by 
the  law.  And  though  annual  pilgrimage  was  re- 
garded as  meritorious,  the  name  "pilgrimage  of 
Islam  "  was  given  to  that  which  a  Believer  performed 
once  in  his  lifetime,  any  other  being  supererogatory. 

But  the  question  arose :  if  residence  in  Meccah 
were  meritorious,  if  it  meant  in  reality  neighbourhood 
to  God,  how  came  it  that  one  visit  of  a  few  days  was 
sufficient  ?  Ought  not  the  devotee  to  reside  there 
all  his  life  ?  Hence  there  were  persons  who  followed 
this  argument  to  its  logical  conclusion,  and  earned 
the  title  "  neighbour  of  Allah."  But  others  felt  more 
inclined  to  spiritualise  the  precept,  and  make  the 
pilgrimage  allegorical ;  the  intellectual  journey  was 
to  serve  instead  of  the  actual.  A  man  who  had 
provided  2000  dirhems  for  journey  money  to  Meccah 
was  told  by  a  saint  that  he  could  acquire  more  merit 
by  disbursing  them  in  charity  than  by  going  on 
pilgrimage  with  them ;  ^  the  very  thought  of  pre- 
ferring the  pilgrimage  to  the  charity  was  a  sign  that 
the  man's  soul  had  been  blinded  by  greed. 

1  K.  K.  i.  95. 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDAN   ETHICS     159 

To  the  ceremonies  of  the  pilgrimage  there  was  no 
occasion  to  make  any  addition ;  that  institution 
ah'eady  contained  a  number  which  originally  had 
belonged  to  different  sanctuaries  and  different  cults. 
One  point  wherein  the  ordinary  interpretation  of  the 
precept  could  be  straitened  was  with  regard  to  the 
period  of  life  wherein  it  should  be  undertaken ;  and 
Abu  Talib  decides  that  a  man  should  make  the 
pilgrimage  so  soon  as  the  act  is  within  his  power. 
From  the  words  of  the  Prophet  at  the  Farewell 
Pilgrimage  it  was  inferred  that  no  man  was  a 
complete  Moslem  who  had  not  yet  gone  through 
this  ceremony ;  Omar,  it  was  said,  had  thought  of 
imposing  the  poll-tax  on  all  who  had  not  yet  per- 
formed it,  since  they  were  no  better  than  Jews  or 
Christians.  Some  authorities  held  that  no  prayers 
should  be  said  over  the  graves  of  wealthy  Moslems 
who  had  failed  to  carry  out  this  obligation,  and  texts 
of  the  Koran  wherein  the  lost  solicit  a  return  to  this 
world  in  order  to  make  good  omissions  were  inter- 
preted of  this  ceremony. 

Then  some  additional  merit  could  be  acquired  by 
rendering  the  journey,  which  in  any  case  was  fatigu- 
ing, additionally  difficult.  Any  invention  or  appli- 
ance which  was  calculated  to  increase  the  rider's 
comfort  was  to  be  condemned ;  the  same  was  to  be 
held  of  all  ostentation  or  display  of  wealth ;  the 
colour  red  in  particular  was  to  be  avoided.  The 
employment  of  luxurious  litters  on  this  occasion  was 
said  to  have  been  an  innovation  of  the  notorious 
Hajjaj    Ibn    Yusuf,    an    Umayyad    governor   whose 


160    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

name  became  proverbial  for  tyranny  and  ruthlessness, 
and  who  might  with  certainty  be  reckoned  among 
the  lost.^  The  most  meritorious  procedure  was  to 
walk  ;  but,  since  the  course  which  caused  the  greatest 
amount  of  discomfort  was  the  best,  probably  the 
sound  reply  was  that  of  a  jurist  who  held  that  the 
person  to  whom  the  hiring  of  a  mount  occasioned 
more  mental  anguish  than  walking,  had  better  hire. 

In  the  matter  of  sacrifice  the  oldest  system  of 
valuation  was  retained :  the  more  valuable  the 
animal  the  better  the  sacrifice  :  quality  was  to  be 
considered  above  quantity.  Omar  was  offered  the 
price  of  thirty  beasts  for  the  beast  which  he  proposed 
to  sacrifice,  but  was  told  by  the  Prophet  to  refuse. 
The  list  of  possible  blemishes  in  the  animal  to  be 
offered  is  made  out  with  an  elaboration  which  we 
miss  even  in  the  Levitical  code.  It  may  be  observed 
that  the  Koran  is  no  less  positive  than  the  Hebrew 
Prophets  that  God  can  have  no  possible  use  for  a 
slaughtered  animal ;  but  this  hardihood  in  theory  was 
not  accompanied  by  similar  hardihood  in  practice  ;  it 
was  not  for  the  Prophet  of  Allah  to  deprive  Allah  of 
any  honour  which  had  previously  been  paid  him. 

Further,  it  was  possible  to  divest  the  feast  of  all 
festive  elements  by  emphasising  the  seriousness  of  the 
occasion  ;  the  same  transformation  was  to  be  effected 
as  that  which  the  teaching  of  St  Paul  brought  about 
in  the  Christian  love-feasts.  So  far  as  possible  the 
pilgrim  was  to  fast  and  maintain  silence ;  his  service 
might  count  on  acceptance  if  he  made  his  pilgrimage 

1  Jahiz,  Hayawan  iv,  146. 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDAN   ETHICS     161 

an  occasion  to  substitute  pious  for  impious  associates, 
and  meditation  on  serious  matters  for  sport.  In 
Meccah  only  were  men  responsible  for  evil  thoughts 
and  punishable  for  entertaining  them.  Omar  said  he 
would  rather  commit  seventy  sins  elsewhere  than  one 
in  Meccah  ;  and  there  were  pilgrims  who  pitched  two 
tents,  one  within  and  one  outside  the  sacred  area,  in 
order  to  be  safe.  And  the  danger  which  resulted 
from  the  extreme  sanctity  of  Meccah  was  probably 
the  reason  why  the  "  neighbourhood  of  Allah  "  was 
not  ordinarily  thought  desirable.  Besides  this,  it  was 
clear  that  familiarity  could  not  fail  to  produce  a 
certain  amount  of  contempt,  or  at  least  diminution  of 
reverence ;  Meccah  at  a  distance  was  more  glorious 
than  it  appeared  to  a  resident.  To  this  consideration 
there  was  to  be  added  the  sordid  and  mundane  one 
that  everything  was  costly  at  Meccah,  although, 
according  to  some,  it  was  sinful  to  take  rent  for 
houses  or  apartments  in  the  sacred  city. 

The  Sufi  precepts  on  the  subject  of  almsgiving 
agree  almost  verbally  with  those  of  the  Sermon  on  the 
Mount,  and  doubtless  to  some  extent  are  traceable  to 
that  source.  "  Let  not  thy  left  hand  know  what  thy 
right  hand  doeth  "  is  the  form  adopted  for  the  regula- 
tion of  the  procedure ;  the  expression  is  defended  as 
the  sort  of  exaggeration  tolerated  by  the  Arabic 
language,  and  parallels  to  it  are  cited  from  the  Koran. 
As  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  any  ostentation  in 
charity  is  said  to  annul  the  merit  thereby  acquired, 
and  some  ingenious  modes  are  recorded  whereby  the 

givers    of    charity    endeavoured     to     conceal     their 

11 


162    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

personalities.  Where  such  concealment  is  not 
practised,  still  the  attitude  of  the  giver  should  be 
humble,  the  recipient  so  far  as  possible  spared  all 
humiliation  ;  since  it  is  the  giver  who  is  according 
to  the  etymological  theory  of  charity  purified  by  the 
gift,  he  should  acknowledge  that  the  recipient  is  his 
superior  ;  and  though  it  is  the  duty  of  the  recipient 
to  render  thanks,  it  is  his  duty  towards  God,  and  is 
not  a  claim  which  the  giver  should  try  to  enforce. 
For  it  is  the  reward  of  God  which  the  giver  should 
seek  to  obtain,  and  he  cannot  expect  a  double  reward 
for  the  same  act.  The  gift,  it  is  said,  goes  into  the 
hand  of  God  before  it  goes  into  the  hand  of  the 
recipient ;  and  those  recipients  are  to  be  preferred 
who  thank  God  only  for  the  gift.  This  is  the  moral 
of  the  story  of  *A'ishah,  who  when  there  came  the 
revelation  defending  her  honour,  declared  that  God 
was  to  be  thanked  for  it,  not  Mohammed  —  who, 
it  appears,  had  harboured  doubts  concerning  her 
innocence. 

Since  the  giving  of  alms  is  a  matter  wherein  two 
participate,  there  is  necessarily  some  little  conflict  of 
interests,  giving  rise  to  differences  of  opinion.  It 
would  seem  to  be  the  interest  of  the  giver  that  the 
gift  should  be  kept  secret,  since  only  thus  can  its 
sincerity  be  assured ;  on  the  other  hand,  it  is  the 
interest  of  the  recipient  that  it  should  be  public,  since 
the  latter  ought  to  harbour  no  false  pride.  Again,  it 
is  to  the  spiritual  interest  of  the  giver  that  the  gift 
should  be  as  large  as  possible,  whereas  the  recipient 
should  take  the  least  which  necessity  permits.     The 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDAN   ETHICS     163 

saint  Junaid — perhaps  before  the  days  of  his  con- 
version— hearing  that  another  saint  held  out  his 
hand  for  gifts  with  the  view  of  enabhng  wealthy 
people  to  obtain  merit  in  the  next  world,  sent 
a  hundred  dirhems  plus  some  unknown  quantity. 
The  recipient  accepted  the  unknown  quantity,  but 
returned  the  hundred  dirhems ;  since  God  would 
accept  only  that  which  was  sent  on  the  principle 
that  the  right  hand  should  not  know  what  the  left 
hand  doeth.  Others  refused  gifts  offered  in  public 
and  accepted  them  in  private,  alleging  that  it  was 
unlawful  to  give  alms  in  public  and  they  could  not 
countenance  breaches  of  the  law,  or  more  naively 
confessing  that  they  disliked  the  humiliation.  Yet 
another  theory,  which  neglected  the  intermediaries 
and  saw  no  cause  but  God,  ignored  the  difference 
between  the  hidden  and  the  open,  and  made  no 
distinction  between  the  public  and  the  private  alms. 
Abu  Talib  makes  the  whole  question  one  of  casuistry, 
to  be  settled  by  the  character  of  individual  donors 
and  recipients,  the  general  principle  being  that  the 
giver  should  conceal  and  the  taker  reveal. 

The  apparent  simplicity  of  the  Koranic  teaching 
was  thus  gradually  altered  into  elaborate  ritualism  ; 
and  the  moderation  of  Islam  was  forgotten.  The 
weekly  day  of  worship,  which  was  almost  a  surrogate 
for  the  Saturday  and  Sunday  of  the  Jews  and 
Christians,  since  the  text  of  the  Koran  expressly 
permits  the  conduct  of  business  except  actually 
during  the  time  when  public  worship  is  going  on, 
became  assimilated   to    those    other    days    of    rest, 


164    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

although  it  seems  clear  that  the  Prophet  regarded 
the  Jewish  Sabbath  as  anything  but  a  blessing  to  the 
community  which  observed  it.  The  permission  to 
transact  business  was  interpreted  away  as  permission 
to  ask  God's  favour  by  prayer.  Special  merit  was 
assigned  to  an  early  appearance  in  the  mosque ;  he 
was  to  be  accounted  a  lukewarm  INIoslem  wdio  only 
arrived  in  time  to  take  part  in  the  midday  worship. 
Men  were  enjoined  to  put  on  festal  attire  ;  a  tradition 
ascribed  to  the  Prophet  made  the  Friday  bath 
obligatory.  Both  sexes  should  employ  perfume ; 
the  men  such  as  displayed  its  odour  but  concealed 
its  colour  ;  the  women  such  as  concealed  its  odour 
but  displayed  its  colour.  The  visit  to  the  mosque 
on  the  Friday  was  to  be  thought  of  as  a  visit  to  the 
House  of  God,  wherein  the  ceremonies  usual  when 
the  humble  visit  the  great  should  be  observed.  The 
turban  should  not  be  removed  from  the  head,  at  any 
rate  while  the  public  service  is  going  on  ;  for  that 
curious  difference  between  Eastern  and  Western 
etiquette  is  emphasised  here  also.  Otherwise  the 
Friday  is  to  be  regarded  as  a  day  of  rest,  yet  in  the 
Puritan  sense  :  pleasure  is  as  reprehensible  therein  as 
work.  The  term  work  is  not,  of  course,  applied  to 
religious  study ;  but  any  other  sort  should  be 
avoided.  Even  the  collection  which  forms  part  of 
most  Christian  services  finds  some  imitation.  The 
giving  of  alms  at  the  conclusion  of  the  Friday 
service  is  specially  meritorious. 

The  transference  of  a  feast  into  a  fast  is  noteworthy, 
but  belongs  to  a  whole  class  of  phenomena  depending 


DEVELOPMENT   OF   MOHAMMEDAN   ETHICS     165 

on  the  spiritualisation  of  religion,  whereas  our  word 
"  hoUday  "  illustrates  either  the  reverse  process,  or  the 
persistence  in  stereotyped  form  of  the  earlier  notion 
attaching  to  holiness.  Fasting  on  the  Friday  is 
recommended  by  some  saints — whether  in  imitation 
of  Christians  or  because  holiness  is  associated  with 
fasting  rather  than  with  feasting.  The  laying  in  a 
stock  of  provisions  on  the  Thursday  for  use  on  the 
Friday  is  deprecated  :  only  spiritual  provisions  should 
be  laid  in. 

The  fancy  of  pious  Moslems  was  largely  occupied 
with  devising  myths  on  the  subject  of  the  Friday  ; 
besides  being  the  day  whereon  Adam  was  created,  it 
was  also  the  day  of  his  fall  and  the  day  of  his  death  ; 
the  two  last  scarcely  reasons  for  festive  commemora- 
tion. Like  the  Christian  Sunday  it  is  also  to  be  the 
day  of  the  Resurrection.  Just  as  the  Jewish  Sabbath 
is  thought  to  be  kept  by  the  Deity  Himself,  so  there 
is  a  tradition  that  every  Friday  Allah  performs  a 
great  act  of  manumission,  which  with  mankind  is 
especially  pious  :  He  releases  sixty  thousand  souls  that 
are  imprisoned  in  Hell. 

Special  forms  of  prayer  were  invented  for  the 
Friday  by  the  Prophet  Idris,  and  the  saint  Ibrahim 
Ibn  Adham :  their  employment  ensures  the  vouch- 
safing of  whatever  the  Believer  requests  ;  but,  indeed, 
there  is  some  particular  time  on  the  Friday  when 
prayer  is  quite  certain  to  be  answered.  There  are, 
however,  great  differences  of  opinion  as  to  the  loca- 
tion of  this  moment,  and  some  deny  that  it  can  be 
located.     It   is   comparable   to  the  Night  of  Kadar, 


166    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

which    is    some   night   but   no   particular    night   in 
Ramadan. 

Up  to  this  point  we  have  only  traced  the  channels 
through  which  the  Islamic  ascetics  worked  their  way 
to  higher  things,  or  at  least  to  notions  whose  abstract- 
ness  contrasts  singularly  with  the  materialism  of  the 
Koran,  and  the  political  and  military  role  which  the 
Islamic  Prophet  played.  Their  exercises  and  specu- 
lations, as  will  be  seen,  led  them  still  further  from 
the  doctrines  of  the  Koran,  and  exposed  them  to  the 
censure  and  even  execration  of  orthodox  jurists  who 
might  have  been  prepared  to  accompany  them  in 
their  earlier  stages.  So  long,  however,  as  their  pro- 
cedure was  confined  to  exaggerated  observance  of 
Koranic  institutions  they  won  the  respect  of  their 
fellows,  and  earned  the  right  to  rebuke  vice,  and  in 
general  to  look  after  the  morals  of  the  community. 
And  even  when  their  extravagances  brought  upon 
them  official  censure,  and  even  terrible  punishments, 
their  memory  was  apt  to  be  cherished  by  the  masses, 
whom  their  saintliness  had  impressed. 


LECTURE   VI 

ASCETICISM    LEADING   TO    PANTHEISM 

If  we  have  hitherto  found  the  ascetic  occupied 
with  exaggeration  of  the  four  performances  enjoined 
by  Islam,  we  shall  now  find  him  developing  unlooked- 
for  consequences  from  the  primary  proposition  of  the 
system — there  is  no  God  but  Allah,  with  Whom 
nothing  must  be  associated.  The  sense  of  the  former 
expression  naturally  depends  on  the  meaning  to  be 
assigned  to  the  word  "god,"  whereon  the  pious 
perhaps  preferred  not  to  speculate ;  but  the  meaning 
of  **  association "  could  be  studied  without  danger, 
and  it  followed  that  nothing  else  might  be  admitted 
into  any  sphere  where  God  was  to  be  found.  If,  e.g., 
God  is  to  be  loved,  then  nothing  else  may  be  loved  ; 
any  other  object  of  affection  would  be  associated  with 
God,  and  the  person  who  bestowed  the  affection 
would  be  a  pagan.  The  same  argument  excludes  all 
desires ;  if  the  worshipper's  object  is  Paradise,  then 
he  is  desiring  something  besides  God,  and  so  is  a 
polytheist.  The  notion  thereby  comes  in  that  the 
ceremonies  enjoined  by  the  code  have  only  dis- 
ciplinary value,  as  helps  to  the  attainment  of  the 
true  knowledge  and  realisation  of  the  divine  unity. 

167 


168    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

Whence  we  shall  find  that  the  most  advanced  among 
the  mystics  declared  that  these  performances  were  no 
longer  necessary  in  their  case,  but  were  to  be  kept  up, 
if  at  all,  for  the  edification  of  the  vulgar.  They 
formed  part  of  a  discipline  to  be  undergone  in  pursuit 
of  an  end. 

Most  of  the  ascetic  practices  enumerated  could  be 
summed  up  in  the  word  "  poverty,"  since  that  at 
which  the  Sufi  aims  is  to  undergo  out  of  choice  the 
privations  which  the  poor  man  undergoes  out  of 
necessity.  Doubtless  the  chief  merit  lies  in  the 
privation  being  voluntary ;  and  in  general  there  is  a 
tendency  in  all  hagiologies  to  demonstrate  that  the 
saints  were  in  origin  persons  of  wealth  and  station 
who  had  voluntarily  abandoned  what  most  men  prize. 
But  if  the  enjoyment  of  luxuries  is  absolutely  wicked, 
it  would  seem  clear  that  poverty  has  the  advantage 
of  safety.  And  this  premise  is  certainly  assumed. 
Severe  as  are  the  doctrines  formulated  by  Abu  Talib 
on  the  subject  of  hospitality,  he  mentions  five  reasons 
which  justify  a  man  who  has  accepted  an  invitation 
to  a  meal  in  going  away  leaving  it  untasted  ;  one  is 
the  employment  by  the  host  of  silver  plate,  to  the 
extent  even  of  the  stopper  of  a  vessel.  Ahmad  Ibn 
Hanbal  before  the  Inquisition  was  invited  to  a 
banquet,  and  accepted  the  invitation  ;  seeing  a  silver 
vessel  on  the  cloth  he  rose  and  left,  his  disciples  or 
admirers  following  him  ;  as  may  be  imagined,  to  the 
consternation  of  the  host,  who  had  reason  to  be 
thankful  that  they  had  not  followed  their  convictions 
to  the  extent  of  damaging  the  goods.     Similarly,  the 


ASCETICISM   LEADING   TO   PANTHEISM        169 

presence  of  satin  is  a  justification  for  quitting ;  any- 
one who  by  staying  assents  to  the  employment  of 
such  a  luxury  becomes  a  participator  in  the  crime. 

Hence  we  get  a  series  of  aphorisms  attributed  to 
the  Prophet  containing  glowing  eulogies  of  poverty, 
though  we  should  have  thought  the  Prophet  had  had 
far  too  great  experience  of  affairs  to  take  such  a  view 
seriously.  Similar  aphorisms  are  ascribed  to  leading 
saints ;  piety  amid  wealth  is  like  a  garden  growing 
on  a  dunghill ;  where  there  is  poverty  it  is  like  a  pearl 
necklace  on  a  fair  woman. 

The  notion  of  poverty  is,  of  course,  a  relative  one, 
and  since  wealth  means  storage  of  provisions,  the 
completest  poverty  is  where  there  is  no  store  of  any 
sort,  and  the  poor  man  is  also  a  beggar.  This  mode 
of  life  does  not  appear  to  have  had  the  Prophet's 
approval,  and  he  is  even  said,  in  accepting  the  sub- 
mission or  conversion  of  some  tribes,  to  have  stipulated 
that  they  should  not  beg.  The  limit  of  storage  is 
fixed  by  the  Koranic  statement  that  God  made  an 
appointment  with  Moses  for  the  fortieth  day ;  for 
if  a  man  may  count  on  living  forty  days,  it  follows 
that  he  has  a  licence  to  store  for  forty  days.  The 
better  theory  is  doubtless  that  death  should  be 
expected  momentarily,  whence  only  a  minimum  of 
storage  should  be  permitted.  A  mendicant  Sufi  to 
whom  a  purse  containing  hundreds  of  dirhems  was 
given,  had  spent  the  whole  by  supper-time  and  had  to 
beg  for  that  meal.  He  explained  that  he  had  not 
expected  to  live  so  long ;  had  he  done  so,  he  would 
have  saved  up  for  it. 


170    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

To  some  extent  the  admiration  and  cultivation  of 
poverty  is  limited  by  the  fatahstic  doctrine  according 
to  which  a  man's  rizk  or  fortune  is  settled  by  God, 
whence  he  can  no  more  evade  it  than  he  can  escape 
death  ;  he  who  rejects  a  windfall  is  rejecting  a  gift 
of  God,  and  so  is  committing  an  act  of  ingratitude 
and  discourtesy.  There  would  appear  to  be  consider- 
able variety  not  only  in  fortunes,  but  in  the  places 
in  which  fortune,  or  at  any  rate  sustenance,  is 
assigned  ;  some  persons  will  find  it  in  ten  thousand 
places,  others  only  in  one.  A  saint  who  left  the  city 
to  live  in  the  desert  in  the  belief  that  God  would 
send  him  his  provision  there,  after  a  week  was  near 
dying  of  starvation :  when  he  returned  to  the  town 
he  found  supplies  flowing  in  from  all  sides. 

Humility,  or  rather  humiliation,  is  to  be  practised 
by  the  aspirant  to  unheard-of  degrees.  A  man  com- 
plained to  Bistami  that  in  spite  of  constant  fasting 
and  prayer  he  could  not  attain  to  the  experiences  of 
the  saints.  Bistami  told  him  that  the  reason  of  this 
was  that  he  still  harboured  some  pride ;  the  exercise 
that  he  recommended  was  that  the  man  should 
take  a  bag  of  nuts,  collect  the  street  arabs  round 
him,  and  offer  a  nut  to  any  boy  who  cuffed  him  ; 
the  aspirant  refused  the  suggestion,  and  Bistami 
declined  to  offer  another.  A  Sufi  stole  the  best 
clothes  from  a  public  bath,  and  exhibited  his  booty 
for  no  other  purpose  than  that  he  might  become  the 
object  of  public  contempt  and  reprobation.  Some 
begged  that  alms  might  be  put  into  their  hands,  only 
because  with  the  Arabs  it  was  thought  humiliating 


ASCETICISM   LEADING   TO   PANTHEISM        171 

to  have  anything  put  into  the  palm.  The  process 
which  the  ascetic  should  go  through  is  not  unlike 
that  which  Plato  recommends  the  just  man ;  he 
should  find  no  fault  when  charged  with  capital 
offences  ;  he  should  chafe  under  no  depreciation  or 
detraction.  He  should  feel  no  pleasure  when  he  is 
praised.  Christ  is  said  to  have  pointed  out  that 
things  grow  in  the  mould,  and  the  divine  knowledge 
only  takes  root  in  a  heart  that  is  like  the  mould  in 
abasement.  Humility  is  their  trade  like  the  sweeper's 
or  the  scavenger's.  Yet  this  humility  is  external 
only :  and  it  is  even  defined  as  being  too  proud  to  be 
proud.  The  Sufi  who  willingly  casts  his  lot  with 
the  lowest  is  prepared  to  say  Glory  to  me  !  in  his 
identification  of  himself  with  the  object  of  his 
adoration.  He  can  take  liberties  with  God  which 
to  ordinary  men  seem  blasphemous. 

Just  as  the  Sufi  should  be  satisfied  with  ill-health, 
so  he  should  practise  resignation  in  things  great  and 
small.  He  should  not  complain  of  the  weather  ;  he 
should  not  say  poverty  is  a  trial  and  a  family  a 
nuisance ;  he  should  say,  like  Ibn  Mas'ud,  "  Wealth 
and  poverty  are  a  pair  of  steeds,  I  care  not  which  of 
the  two  I  ride." 

According  to  this  doctrine  he  has  no  more  right 
to  find  fault  with  prosperity  than  with  adversity  ; 
finding  fault  at  all  is  ingratitude,  which  in  the  Arabic 
idiom  is  synonymous  with  unbelief.  Anas,  who 
served  the  Prophet  ten  years,  never  heard  him  find 
fault  with  anything,  or  complain  of  omission  or  com- 
mission.     When    an   ancient   prophet  prayed  to  be 


172    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

delivered  from  poverty,  he  was  shown  that  this 
prayer  meant  a  rewriting  of  the  whole  system  of 
events  foreordained  by  God  :  by  repeating  this  prayer 
he  would  forfeit  his  claim  to  be  written  in  the  book 
of  life. 

Examples  are  quoted  of  the  degree  of  resignation 
which  some  of  the  saints  aspired  to  attain.  One  who 
claimed  to  be  little  more  than  a  beginner  expressed 
his  willingness  to  be  damned  alone  among  mankind. 
Another  who  acknowledged  to  having  got  on  a  little 
way  was  satisfied  to  be  the  bridge  over  Hell  whereby 
the  saved  will  pass,  and  when  all  mankind  had  passed 
over  him,  to  fill  Hell  by  himself,  in  order  that  the  oath 
of  God,  who  had  sworn  to  fill  it,  might  not  be  violated. 
A  saint  who  had  been  bedridden  with  dropsy  thirty 
years  repudiated  sympathy,  because  he  liked  best 
what  God  liked  best.  One  whose  prayers  were  by 
the  Prophet's  blessing  always  answered,  and  so  healed 
numbers  who  solicited  his  aid,  was  asked  why  he  did 
not  pray  that  he  might  recover  his  own  sight :  he 
replied  that  God's  will  was  to  him  a  better  thing. 

Since  resignation  cannot  easily  be  displayed  save 
where  there  are  troubles,  the  theory  that  misfortunes 
are  a  just  cause  for  glorification  speedily  arises.  No 
one  of  you,  said  a  preacher,  will  meet  God  without 
having  lied  to  Him :  meaning  without  having  con- 
cealed some  misfortune  :  if  one  had  a  golden  finger,  he 
would  parade  it ;  if  he  had  a  broken  finger,  he  would 
conceal  it. 

A  question  which  suggested  itself  was  the  attitude 
which   the    devotee   should    adopt    towards    death : 


ASCETICISM   LEADING  TO   PANTHEISM         173 

should  he  desire  it  for  the  sake  of  meeting  God  ; 
or  should  he  prefer  to  live  because  life  was  all  trouble 
and  service  ;  or  should  he  not  mind — have  no  wish 
either  way  ?  Clearly  the  last  had  attained  the  ideal 
state  and  was  above  the  other  two  ;  but  the  relative 
merits  of  the  other  two  might  be  the  subject  of  dis- 
cussion. There  was  always  the  danger  in  the  case  of 
the  lover  of  life  that  he  might  be  mistaken  about  his 
real  motive :  he  might  confuse  what  was  in  reality  a 
physical  repulsion  to  death  with  the  desire  to  exhibit 
resignation  ;  the  true  attitude  towards  life  and  death 
was  that  of  the  water  in  a  well :  it  remained  there 
without  choice  of  its  own,  ready  at  any  time  to  be 
drawn. 

This  attitude  of  complete  passivity  seems  something 
very  different  from  the  active  life  of  the  followers  of 
the  Prophet,  with  its  fierce  enmities  and  warm  loves. 
The  only  way  wherein  the  two  theories  of  life  could 
be  reconciled  was  by  the  doctrine  that  the  devotee 
should  be  in  complete  sympathy  with  God,  and  share 
His  loves  and  hates. 

Hence  we  come  back  to  personal  choice,  and  the 
doctrine  of  resignation  is  not  found  to  work.  The 
mystic  Sirri  Sakati  gave  up  his  business  because  he 
had  said  "  Thank  God "  when  he  was  told  that  all 
the  shops  in  the  street  had  been  burned  down  except 
his ;  he  uttered  this  exclamation,  but  immediately 
became  conscious  of  its  selfishness,  and  selling  all  he 
had,  gave  it  to  the  poor.  Discontent,  then,  was  what 
first  started  him  on  the  road  to  resignation. 

Probably  the  conduct  of  Sirri  Sakati  will  be  found 


174   EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

philanthropic  and  commendable  ;  but  we  fancy  that 
the  Sufi  is  unable  to  maintain  his  transmutation 
of  values  very  long ;  they  have  an  extraordinary 
tendency  to  come  back,  and  be  assumed  as  current 
after  they  have  definitely  been  repudiated.  If  loss 
of  property  is  not  a  fit  subject  for  complaint,  it  is  not 
clear  why  this  saint  should  have  adopted  this  course  ; 
his  thanking  God  was  not  an  act  that  required  thirty 
years'  atonement.  And  the  willingness  which  these 
saints  display  to  endure  Hell-fire  seriously  invalidates 
the  threats  of  the  Koran ;  for  only  that  can  be  used 
as  an  effective  threat  which  men  will  avoid  to  the 
very  uttermost. 

Difficulties  and  contradictions  also  arise  from  the 
maxim  of  sympathising  with  God's  loves  and  hates. 
To  the  Prophet  this  maxim  was  simple  enough  :  God 
loved  those  who  acknowledged  His  Prophet,  hated 
those  who  rejected  him.  But  in  the  more  complicated 
conditions  of  the  later  Islamic  states  this  simple 
distinction  was  insufficient :  the  whole  population 
by  no  means  consisted  of  saints.  Hence  high 
authority  was  quoted  for  the  doctrine  that  a  man 
who  was  beloved  by  his  neighbours  was  necessarily  a 
hypocrite. 

The  cultivation  of  poverty,  humiliation,  and  resig- 
nation belong  to  the  negative  aspect  of  the  first 
proposition  of  the  creed  ;  if  the  word  "  god  "  signifies 
an  object  of  attachment,  then  the  ascetic  who  follows 
the  discipline  which  has  been  sketched  has  clearly 
severed  bonds  which  ordinarily  attach  men  to  other 
things  than  God ;  but  there  is  also  the  positive  side 


ASCETICISM   LEADING   TO   PANTHEISM        175 

of  the  proposition  to  be  considered — and  this  is 
summed  up  in  the  phrase  "love  of  God."  That 
notion  is,  of  course,  taken  over  from  older  systems, 
and  is  found  in  the  Koran.  The  erotic  sentiment, 
which  is  rarely  quite  absent  from  religion,  has  prob- 
ably been  identified  with  it  by  the  Snfis  more  than 
by  any  other  devotees.  Wives  are  supposed  to  have 
left  their  husbands  because  the  love  of  God  tolerated 
no  other  affection  besides  itself.  The  woman  saint 
RabPah  'Adwiyyah  rejected  one  proposal  of  marriage 
after  another,  declining  the  most  munificent  offers, 
on  the  ground  that  the  whole  of  the  suitors'  fortune 
was  not  good  enough  to  distract  her  mind  from  the 
thought  of  God  for  a  single  instant.  Some  wonder- 
ful verses  wherein  she  described  her  sentiment  are 
preserved : 

"  I  love  thee  with  two  loves,  a  love  that  is  passion 

And  one  which  besides  thou  hast  earned  as  thy  due. 
The  passionate  love  is  the  thought  which  forgetting 

All  else  is  of  you,  aye,  for  ever  of  you. 
Thou  earnedst  the  other  by  rending  asunder 

All  veils  and  disclosing  thyself  to  my  view. 
Not  mine  be  the  praise  for  the  one  or  the  other. 

The  praise  and  the  thanks  are  all  thine  for  the  two." 

According  to  Abu  Talib  God's  love  resembles 
human  affection  in  some  respects ;  those  whom  the 
Divine  Being  loves  can  count  on  pardon  when  they 
sin.  The  brethren  of  Joseph  in  the  Koranic  narrative 
committed  no  fewer  than  forty  offences  ;  yet,  because 
they  were  beloved  of  God,  all  were  forgiven.  On  the 
other  hand,  Ezra  committed   one   offence   only — he 


176    EARLY  DEVELOPMExNT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

asked  a  question  about  predestination,  and  was  erased 
from  the  list  of  prophets  in  consequence.  God's  love 
is  not,  however,  due  to  anything,  as  human  affection 
is  due  to  kinship,  to  the  possession  of  qualities,  to  the 
hope  of  advantage,  etc.  ;  it  is  a  free  and  mysterious 
choice  from  the  beginning  of  the  world.  Such  a 
mystery  is  known  only  to  prophets,  and  to  reveal  it 
would  be  unbelief.  Only  by  special  revelation  does  a 
man  know  that  he  has  been  thus  favoured  ;  and  the 
Sufis  agree  with  older  thinkers  that  affliction  and 
bereavement  are  a  surer  sign  thereof  than  prosperity. 

Unintelligible  as  is  much  of  the  Sufi  language  from 
the  abstruseness  of  their  subject,  the  authors  confess 
that  there  are  further  mysteries  which  either  cannot 
or  may  not  be  revealed,  and  which  can  only  be 
transferred  from  heart  to  heart.  An  example  is  to 
be  found  in  the  eighth  fear,  which  Abu  Talib 
mentions,  but  dare  not  describe. 

That  the  higher  stages  of  Sufism  were  akin  to 
madness  is  not  only  clear  of  itself,  but  is  sometimes 
acknowledged ;  Ibn  *Arabi  boasts  of  having  for  a 
time  lost  his  reason.  A  fraction  of  a  grain  of  the 
love  of  God  bestowed  at  the  intercession  of  a  saint 
upon  an  aspirant  drove  him  mad  ;  by  renewed  inter- 
cession the  dose  was  so  reduced  that  the  aspirant 
recovered  his  reason.  Ibrahim  Ibn  Adham  com- 
plained of  the  constant  mental  agitation  which  his 
spiritual  progress  caused  :  he  was  asked  in  reply  if  he 
knew  of  any  lover  who  was  free  from  agitation.  The 
attitude  of  the  Divine  Being  towards  these  lovers  is 
made  to  resemble  that  of  the  capricious  beauty :  the 


ASCETICISM   LEADING  TO   PANTHEISM        177 

lover's  attachment  is  kept  warm  by  occasional  frowns 
and  neglect.     Perfect  love  does  not  cast  out  fear. 

In  the  SCifi  poetry,  as  we  have  seen,  some  female 
name  is  employed  as  the  symbol  for  the  object  of  the 
poet's  passion,  and  it  is  hard  to  separate  this  practice 
from  the  old  worship  of  goddesses  which  was  so  pre- 
valent among  the  ancient  nations.  The  danger  of 
the  practice  was  obvious  :  one  Ahmad  Ibn  'Isa  al- 
Kharraz  in  a  dream  told  another  Sufi  that  he  had 
been  rebuked  for  putting  the  likeness  of  the  Divine 
Being  on  Layla  and  Sauda— stock-names  in  the 
erotic  poetry  of  the  Arabs.  Such  verses,  then,  it  is 
held,  are  only  for  those  who  can  penetrate  through 
the  symbolism. 

The  close  connection  between  music  and  things 
erotic  is  evinced  by  the  history  of  this  Sufi  poetry. 
It  seems  clear  that  music  and  poetry,  which  played 
so  important  a  part  in  both  Christian  and  Jewish 
ritual,  were  eschewed  by  the  Prophet,  who  even 
deUvered  a  polemic  against  the  poets,  though  at  a 
later  period  he  accepted  the  services  of  a  court-poet, 
whom  he  is  even  said  to  have  declared  inspired  by 
the  Holy  Spirit.  Still,  the  Koran  says  of  the  Prophet, 
''  We  have  not  taught  him  versification  "  ;  and  there 
is  no  place  in  the  religious  services  which  he  instituted 
for  hynms  or  odes.  The  Sufis,  however,  found  that 
the  ode  had  the  power  to  remind  the  devotee  of  God, 
to  stir  his  religious  emotions,  and  they  cannot  there- 
fore neglect  it  as  a  means  of  approaching  the  Deity. 
According  to  Abu  Tahb  this  use  of  poetry  goes  back 
to  Ja'far  the  winded,  the  brother  of  Ali  who  died  a 


178    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

martyr's  death  at  Mutah  and  was  seen  by  the  Prophet 
winged  in  Paradise.  Music  was  employed  in  the 
services  of  the  days  in  Ramadan  called  Tashrik,  by 
the  devotees  of  Arabia,  the  practice  having  been 
introduced  by  'Ata  Ibn  Abi  Rabah.  This  personage 
kept  two  singing  women  to  aid  his  companions  in 
their  devotions.  If  such  a  performance  excites  the 
hearer  to  any  worldly  passion,  then  indeed  he  is  not 
entitled  to  listen ;  but  if  it  turns  his  thoughts  to  God 
and  excites  purely  spiritual  longings,  then  he  may 
listen  with  profit.  To  spiritual  poetry  of  this  sort 
the  name  kasidah,  usually  used  for  encomium,  might 
be  employed,  but  not  ughniyah,  which  was  too 
suggestive  of  the  frivolous  performance  which  aided 
the  toper  in  the  enjoyment  of  his  wine. 

One  other  point  wherein  this  spiritual  love  re- 
sembles the  tender  passion  is  that  it  should  be 
concealed — kept  as  a  secret  between  subject  and 
object.  If  a  man  be  asked  whether  he  love  God, 
he  should  remain  silent ;  to  deny  it  would  be  a 
sin,  to  confess  it  would  be  indecorous.  Yet  among 
the  lovers  some  are  sober,  others  intoxicated,  and 
this  concealment  can  only  be  expected  of  the  former ; 
the  latter  have  lost  all  self-control  and  so  are  to  be 
excused. 

If  in  the  Prophet's  time  love  might  be  bestow^ed 
upon  him  as  deputy  for  God,  since  his  departure  it 
may  instead  be  bestowed  on  the  Koran.  The  sacred 
book  inherits  the  affection  once  bestowed  upon  the 
Arabian  goddesses,  just  as  with  the  Jews  the  Law 
gave  a  vent  to  the  passion  once  lavished  on  Ashtoreth 


ASCETICISM   LEADING   TO   PANTHEISM        179 

— a  curious  psychological  parallel.  A  Moslem  does 
not  merit  the  title  *'  aspirant "  until  he  finds  in  the 
Koran  all  that  he  desires.  Love  of  the  Koran  is 
not,  it  would  seem,  quite  easy  to  acquire.  A  saint 
asserted  that  he  had  enjoyed  the  Koran  twenty  years, 
but  it  had  been  a  burden  to  him  for  twenty  years 
before. 

Love  of  God  is  not  only  incompatible  with  the 
bestowal  of  affection  on  other  rational  beings,  but 
even  with  the  most  innocent  enjoyments.  In  a 
revelation  to  Moses  fault  was  found  with  a  man 
who  was  perfect  in  every  other  respect,  but  enjoyed 
the  morning  air.  Another  lost  rank  in  the  spiritual 
world  because  he  transferred  his  oratory  to  a  tree 
where  he  could  enjoy  the  singing  of  a  bird.  God 
is  jealous.  A  devotee  who  had  given  away  all  he 
possessed  asserted  that  this  was  because  he  had 
heard  a  human  lover  promising  his  beloved  the  like 
— sacrifice  of  everything  ;  and  the  divine  beloved  can 
claim  no  less. 

This  road  also  leads  to  the  doctrine  which  is  so 
characteristic  of  Sufism — contempt  of  Heaven  and 
Hell.  If  God  had  created  neither,  they  scornfully 
ask,  would  he  be  unworthy  to  be  obeyed  ?  Christ, 
according  to  one  of  their  Apocrypha,  passed  by  three 
sets  of  ascetics:  a  party  who  feared  Hell;  a  party 
who  hoped  for  Paradise;  and  a  party  whose  sole 
motive  was  love  of  God.  He  reprimanded  the  first 
and  second  for  making  created  things  the  object  of 
their  hopes  and  fears,  and  took  up  his  abode  with 
the  third. 


180    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

Still,  it  has  to  be  confessed  that  the  Koran  contains 
a  great  deal  about  Paradise  and  its  sensual  delights, 
and  that  Allah  therein  has  encouraged  mankind  to 
look  forward  thereto.  Hence  if  a  man's  purpose 
in  his  service  be  the  hope  of  attaining  these  delights, 
this  cannot  be  said  to  affect  his  sincerity  and  devout- 
ness ;  for  he  has  the  highest  authority  for  such 
aspiration.^  All  that  can  be  said  is  that  these 
persons  fall  short  of  the  rank  attained  by  the  ''  lovers 
of  God  "  ;  for  these  persons  aim  at  complete  freedom 
from  every  other  passion  but  the  love  of  God,  and, 
as  we  have  seen,  are  indifferent  to  all  pains  and 
pleasures,  not  excepting  Heaven  and  Hell. 

But  besides  the  moral  conclusions  to  be  drawn 
from  the  doctrine  of  the  divine  unity,  there  is  also 
a  metaphysical  conclusion ;  and  this  appears  to  be 
the  extreme  attainment  of  the  gnosis.  The  aim  of 
mystical  speculation  may  be  formulated  as  the 
identification  of  the  subject  with  the  object;  and 
the  name  "  unitarian  "  is  mystically  interpreted  with 
reference  to  this  identification.  The  true  unitarian 
is  he  who  recognises  in  the  world  no  existence  save 
God's ;  who  regards  both  himself  and  the  world 
outside  him  as  a  mirror,  yet  rather  one  wherein  the 
Deity  shows  Himself  than  one  wherein  He  is  re- 
flected. It  is  conceivable  that  this  notion  may  have 
come  into  Islam  from  outside ;  on  the  other  hand, 
speculation  on  the  doctrine  of  the  divine  unity  ap- 
pears sufficient  to  account  for  its  development  and 
indeed  for  its  origin.     Had    there  been  more   gods 

1  K.  K.  ii.  151. 


ASCETICISM   LEADING   TO   PANTHEISM         ]81 

than  one,  says  the  Koran,  the  heavens  and  the  earth 
must  have  come  to  grief;  but  if  any  attempt  be 
made  to  define  the  word  *'  god "  metaphysically, 
speculation  quickly  leads  to  something  like  the  truly 
existing  or  the  necessarily  existing ;  even  with 
Homer  the  difference  between  God  and  man  is  that 
the  former  is  eternal,  the  latter  transient.  The 
relation  between  God  and  matter  immediately  sug- 
gests questions  :  is  matter  independent  of  God,  or 
not  ?  The  former  supposition  leads  to  polytheism, 
the  latter  only  is  consistent  with  real  monotheism. 
If,  then,  God  is  not  outside  matter.  He  must  in  a 
way  be  identical  with  matter ;  and  the  most  thought- 
ful of  the  Sufis,  accepting  this  conclusion,  based  on 
it  a  series  of  inferences  as  unlike  the  original  doctrines 
of  Islam  as  any  that  could  have  been  evolved. 

The  main  proposition  of  the  esoteric  Sufism  is,  then, 
this— that  there  is  no  distinction  between  subject 
and  object,  and  that  God,  nature,  and  man  are 
identical.  The  consciousness  of  this  is  to  be  obtained 
through  a  variety  of  exercises,  and  it  would  seem 
that  not  everyone  possesses  the  capacity  to  attain 
thereunto ;  but  those  who  do  attain  thereto  are 
apparently  thought  to  possess  divine  powers.  Indeed 
it  would  seem  clear  that  when  once  the  individual's 
identity  with  the  Deity  is  realised  he  can  do  and  will 
do  what  the  Deity  does.  The  earliest  existing  author 
who  clearly  formulates  this  theory  is  one  Hallaj,  who 
was  executed  in  the  year  922.  We  possess  accounts 
of  this  personage  by  contemporaries  and  by  others 
who  are  little  later,  and  according  to  them  he  claimed 


182    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

divine  powers,  and  even  undertook  to  display  them. 
He  was  the  author  of  numerous  works,  of  which 
a  Ust  was  drawn  up  within  a  century  of  his  death  ; 
they  were  thought  by  his  enemies  to  be  imposture. 
One  of  these  treatises  has  recently  been  recovered 
and  given  to  the  world,  called  the  Tawasin  after 
a  Surah  of  the  Koran ;  the  composition  is  very 
largely  infantile,  consisting  of  the  stringing  together 
of  rhymes  with  very  little  meaning ;  but  it  is  quite 
decided  on  the  doctrine  which  has  been  quoted,  and 
the  famous  words  wherein  Hallaj  identified  himself 
with  God,  "  I  am  the  Truth,"  are  to  be  found  therein. 
Like  somewhat  later  mystics  he  divides  mankind 
into  circles,  the  inmost  being  that  of  the  persons 
who  attain  to  the  consciousness  of  this  identity  with 
the  Divine  Being  ;  and  he  is  followed  by  later  mystics 
in  giving  the  Koran  interpretations  which  it  is  clear 
that  its  author  had  never  conceived  of  its  bearing. 
In  that  work,  naturally  Iblis  (Satan)  and  Pharaoh 
are  quoted  not  as  models  of  conduct,  but  as  examples 
to  be  avoided ;  but  the  Sufis  take  a  different  view. 
Hallaj  reports  a  dialogue  between  himself  and  these 
two  worthies,  wherein  they  are  called  his  masters,  and 
the  words  put  into  their  mouths  in  the  Koran  are 
shown  to  indicate  the  lofty  stage  which  they  had 
attained ;  when  Pharaoh  says  he  is  not  aware  of  any 
god  for  the  Egyptians  but  himself,  what  he  means 
is  that  he  was  the  only  person  in  the  country  who 
had  attained  to  this  esoteric  knowledge  of  the 
identity  of  the  creator  with  the  created ;  and  when 
Iblis  or  Satan  declined  to  bow  down  to  Adam  on  the 


ASCETICISM   LEADING   TO   PANTHEISM        183 

ground  that  he  had  been  created  of  fire  and  Adam 
of  clay,  this  too  is  shown  to  have  been  in  order. 

The  editor  of  this  treatise  has  not  furnished  a 
translation,  thinking  perhaps  that  the  time  has  not 
yet  come  when  one  could  be  executed  with  certainty  ; 
and  the  infantile  jingles  in  which  it  is  very  largely 
couched  would  render  translation  exceedingly  difficult. 
It  is,  however,  of  considerable  interest  to  have  before 
us  the  actual  work  of  the  mystic  who  is  most  famous 
or  most  notorious  for  identifying  himself  with  the 
Divine  Being,  and  whose  terrible  execution  is  the 
subject  of  numerous  descriptions  and  allusions ; 
though  it  would  appear  that  it  was  not  on  account 
of  this  particular  doctrine  that  he  was  condemned 
to  a  barbarous  death,  but  because  he  had  taught  that 
specific  performance  was  not  requisite  in  the  case 
of  the  pilgrimage.  It  is  clear  from  the  nature  of  the 
work  that  it  was  not  intended  to  appeal  to  the  reason, 
but  to  the  emotion,  and  indeed  that  the  mode  of 
delivery  must  have  been  of  a  special  sort  in  order  to 
compass  this  effect. 

In  a  treatise  which  professes  to  be  the  encyclopaedia 
of  a  literary  society  of  the  fourth  Islamic  century 
a  threefold  division  of  mankind  is  attempted  with 
reference  to  their  religious  needs.  There  is  the 
public,  i.e.  the  laity,  who  should  be  encouraged  in 
religious  exercises  because  they  are  thereby  kept  out 
of  mischief ;  for  them  all  that  is  required  is  knowledge 
of  religious  ordinances,  especially  prayer,  fasting,  and 
alms,  about  which  they  need  know  no  more  than  that 
they  are   prescribed.     A  second  class  is  constituted 


184    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

by  what  we  might  call  the  clergy,  or  learned  clerks, 
ix.  those  who  make  it  their  business  to  possess  a 
scholarly  acquaintance  with  the  sources  of  law,  so 
as  to  be  able  to  state  what  the  rule  or  approved 
practice  is  on  any  subject  into  which  the  code  enters. 
But  beyond  this  there  is  a  third  class,  w^ho  occupy 
themselves  with  deeper  matters :  the  nature  and 
attributes  of  God.  These  are  the  thinkers  of  the 
community,  and  to  a  certain  extent  their  learning 
must  be  encyclopaedic  ;  for  they  must  be  aware  of  the 
problems  of  providence  before  they  can  be  in  a 
position  to  find  the  answers.  The  problems  suggested 
by  the  inequalities  of  nature,  e.g.  w^hy  a  centipede 
which  is  so  minute  should  require  a  hundred  legs 
whereas  the  bulky  elephant  can  do  with  four,  have 
to  be  formulated  first  before  the  answer  to  them  can 
be  discovered  ;  and  such  formulation  requires  observa- 
tion and,  indeed,  occasionally  experiment.  Passages 
could  be  cited  from  the  Koran  wherein  reflection  or 
speculation  is  highly  commended ;  people  are  bidden 
to  think  on  the  works  of  nature,  and  arrive  at  sound 
religious  opinions  in  that  way.  In  our  time  there 
are  in  consequence  persons  who  assert  that  the 
physicists  of  Europe  are  the  true  Moslems  and  the 
traditionalists  of  the  East  heretics. 

That  these  precepts  and  the  belief  that  the  highest 
religious  stage  involved  encyclopaedic  attainments 
led  to  no  real  scientific  progress  is  due  to  another 
doctrine,  viz.  that  there  was  a  short-cut  to  knowledge, 
i.e.  revelation.  And,  quite  clearly,  an  explanation  of 
a  difficulty  furnished  by  the  Divine  Being  would  be 


i 
ASCETICISM   LEADING   TO   PANTHEISM        185 

far  more  satisfactory  than  the  best  guess  which  the 
student  might  make  ;  we  philologists  well  know^  that  an 
authoritative  explanation  of  a  passage  is  a  far  better 
thing  than  the  most  ingenious  conjecture.     Now,  the 
doctrine   of    prophecy  involved   the   possibility  that 
certain  persons  might  be  privileged  to  receive  such 
authoritative   communications.     In   a  Surah   of   the 
Koran  we  are  told  how  Moses  went  about  with  one 
who  had   been   favoured  with  knowledge;  this  per- 
sonage  did   some   very   extraordinary  things,  which 
surprised    and    even    shocked    Moses ;    Moses    was 
snubbed  for  his  inquisitiveness,  but  before  his  com- 
panion parted  from  him  he  condescended  to  explain 
his   conduct.      Other    prophets    had    been   similarly 
favoured  ;  they   had   looked   down  on  what  seemed 
gross   unfairness   on   the  part  of  fortune,  good  luck 
coming  to  those  who  neither  required  nor  deserved 
it,  persons  punished  for  offences  which  they  had  not 
committed ;  and  a  divine  communication  had  shown 
that  the  matter  was  of  extreme  simplicity.     When  a 
man  found   a   purse,  the   explanation  was  that   the 
father  of  the  loser  had  owed  the  same  sum  to  the 
finder's  father ;  when  a  man  was  killed  for  an  offence 
which  he  had  not  committed,  it  turned  out  that  he 
was  expiating  his  father's  crime.  When  some  busybody 
endeavoured   to   interfere  with   the   divine   arrange- 
ments, e,g.  by  giving  a  bUnd  boy  his  sight,  the  result 
was    the    upsetting    of    a    beneficent    arrangement. 
Whether    every    reader    of    these    explanations    is 
perfectly    satisfied    with     the     divine     economy    is 
perhaps   open   to   question;   but   there   is  no  doubt 


186    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

that,  supposing  these  explanations  to  be  authoritative, 
they  could  not  have  been  obtained  by  any  amount 
of  study. 

The  fundamental  belief  of  mysticism  is,  then, 
that  knowledge  can  be  obtained  in  this  way:  com- 
munication can  be  established  between  the  human 
being  and  the  Divine  Being,  and  the  keys  to  the 
inner  meaning  of  phenomena  be  thus  obtained. 
It  might  indeed  seem  that  such  a  pretension  was 
injurious  to  the  majesty  of  the  Koran ;  for  a  new 
revelation  could  not  well  be  regarded  as  inferior  to 
the  earlier,  but  should  rather  supersede  the  earlier. 
Some,  therefore,  of  those  who  have  ascribed  their 
works  to  the  Divine  Being  have  endeavoured  some- 
what to  soften  or  to  modify  this  pretension ;  they 
employ  some  word  which,  though  meaning  the  same  as 
"  revelation,"  is  not  one  of  the  synonyms  ordinarily 
employed  in  reference  to  the  Holy  Scripture ;  Ibn 
*Arabi,  though  boldly  pretending  to  an  office  higher 
than  that  of  prophet,  professes  to  have  received 
his  book  from  the  Prophet  Mohammed  in  a  dream — 
taking  care  to  call  attention  to  a  tradition  according 
to  which  Mohammed  cannot  be  personated  in  a 
dream  by  the  devil,  who  otherwise  is  a  quick-change 
artist.  And  in  the  case  of  a  work  of  the  fourth 
century  of  Islam,  which  appears  to  contain  the 
genuine  and  undiluted  mysticism,  the  name  employed 
by  the  writer  is  far  removed  from  those  used  of  the 
Koran  :  each  set  of  aphorisms  begins,  "  He  caused 
me  to  understand  [some  term]  and  said  unto  me  " ; 
where,  however,  the  sequel  shows  that  the  speaker  is 


ASCETICISM   LEADING   TO   PANTHEISM        187 

the  Divine  Being  Himself,  and  the  commentator 
uses  without  hesitation  the  actual  word  whereby 
Koranic  revelations  are  described  in  the  sacred  volume 
itself — "  sendings  down."  These  usually  are  brief 
aphorisms,  but  occasionally  they  extend  to  compli- 
cated paragraphs. 

The  work,  like  several  other  Arabic  monuments,  is 
regularly  embedded  in  a  commentary,  of  which  the 
purpose  is  very  often  to  give  the  opinions  of  the 
author  something  like  an  orthodox  colouring.  Thus 
the  formula  with  which  most  of  the  aphorisms  are 
introduced,"  And  he  said  unto  me,"  where  the  pronoun 
is  shown  by  the  sequel  to  refer  to  the  Divine  Being, 
is  explained  away  the  first  few  times  that  it  occurs : 
the  author  means  that  the  matter  was  put  so  distinctly 
into  his  mind  that  it  was  as  if  the  Divine  Being  had 
said  unto  him.  Early  as  this  work  is  in  the  series 
of  mystic  manuals,  its  author  claims  for  those  who 
are  possessed  of  the  esoteric  knowledge  nothing  less 
than  is  claimed  for  them  at  a  later  time :  such  a 
person  is  God's  viceroy  on  earth.  For  such  a  person 
religious  exercises  cease  to  have  value ;  he  is  above 
all  rules  and  regulations.  The  secret  which  is  revealed 
is  that  God  exists  and  nothing  exists  except  God ; 
the  recognition  of  anything  else  except  God  is 
"  association,"  what  in  the  Koran  is  called  paganism. 
The  terms  defined  are  largely  connected  with  the 
progressive  attainment  of  this  esoteric  knowledge  ; 
knowledge  is  expressed  by  three  different  terms,  of 
which  the  intermediate  appears  to  satisfy  the  writer 
whom  we  have  studied  so  long — Abu  Talib  al-Mekki. 


188    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

The  third  stage,  al-wakfah,  "  standing "  or  "  under- 
standing," is  that  which  constitutes  the  goal  of  the 
true  mystic  ;  and  it  is  that  wherein  all  differences 
between  him  and  the  Divine  Being  are  sunk.  For 
him  neither  the  present  nor  the  future  world  has  any 
existence  ;  the  word  "  other,"  "  besides,"  is  banished 
from  his  vocabulary.  He  cannot  pray :  to  do  so 
would  be  to  acknowledge  that  God  was  different 
from  himself,  and  that  there  were  things  to  be  had 
other  than  that  identity. 

It  is  in  any  case  a  bold  achievement  to  compose  a 
long  series  of  aphorisms  supposed  to  be  uttered  by  the 
Divine  Being,  but  what  must  be  said  for  al-Niffari, 
the  author,  is  that  his  aphorisms  are  profoundly 
earnest ;  they  rarely  suggest  conscious  imposture,  a 
charge  from  which  the  work  of  his  successor,  Ibn 
'Arabi,  cannot  easily  be  exonerated.  They  appear, 
however,  to  contain  constant  repetitions  of  the  same 
thoughts  in  slightly  different  language  ;  the  imagery 
is  at  times  extravagant  and  even  grotesque ;  and  it 
may  often  be  doubted  whether  the  propositions  are 
meant  to  convey  anything  like  their  obvious  meaning. 
But  whatever  be  the  facts  about  the  origin  of  the 
work,  it  seems  clear  that  we  have  in  it  as  bold  and 
undiluted  a  statement  of  the  esoteric  doctrine  of  the 
Sufis  as  can  be  found.     The  treatises  that  are  diluted 

• 

with  ethics  or  homilies  appear  to  have  halted  half-way 
on  the  road ;  their  authors  may  have  themselves 
failed  to  gain  admittance  into  the  inner  circle,  or  have 
been  mentally  unqualified  for  such  progress.  Clearly, 
the   stage   at   which   both   devotional    practice    and 


ASCETICISM   LEADING  TO   PANTHEISM         189 

ascetic  practice  are  flung  aside  as  rudimentary  dis- 
cipline lies  beyond  that  at  which  the  one  or  the 
other  constitutes  the  main  occupation  of  life. 

The  revelations  ordinarily  consist  of  brief  aphor- 
isms, chiefly  definitions  ;  sometimes,  however,  a  fairly 
lengthy  paragraph  is  communicated  at  once,  and  at 
times  the  revelation  takes  the  form  of  a  dialogue 
between  the  author  and  the  Divine  Being ;  or  instead 
of  a  conversation  there  is  the  description  of  a  scene. 
Tlie  practical  aphorisms,  i.e.  such  as  could  be  called 
precepts  or  directions  for  conduct,  are  few  in  number  ; 
and  even  these  are  seemingly  contradictory.  Certain 
words  and  phrases  appear  to  be  employed  in  highly 
technical  senses,  but  not  consistently. 

What  excites  the  wonder  of  the  reader  is  that  a 
treatise  of  this  sort  should  have  been  permitted  to 
survive,  since  its  author  makes  very  light  of  the 
devotions  of  Islam.  It  would  seem,  however,  that 
among  the  few  precepts  which  he  receives,  while  that 
of  writing  down  his  revelations  is  emphasised,  some 
stress  is  also  laid  on  secrecy  and  care  in  the  choice  of 
associates.  Possibly  he  composed  under  an  assumed 
name,  since  the  collectors  of  Sufi  biographies  seem 
to  take  no  notice  of  him ;  and  his  commentator  of 
Tlemsen  has  not  thought  it  worth  while  to  give  any 
account  of  him,  though  he  implies  at  times  that  he 
was  acquainted  with  his  career,  at  any  rate  to  some 
extent.  Nevertheless,  the  impression  which  the  work 
leaves  on  the  mind  is  that  its  author  knows  his 
business  more  than  the  other  Sufis  of  the  fourth 
century,  e.g.  Abu  Talib  al-Mekki.     One  fancies  that 


190    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

he  would  have  declared  these  people  to  have  gone 
no  further  than  the  gnosis,  which  was  only  the 
second  stage  in  the  aspirant's  course ;  gnosis  led 
to  understanding,  which  was  the  highest  stage. 
The  understanding  is  the  person  to  whom  God  is 
revealed. 

The  consequence  that  worship  is  inconsistent  with 
the  state  of  understanding  is  quite  fearlessly  drawn. 
"  The  more  the  sight  of  God  is  extended,  the 
narrower  becomes  the  sphere  of  worship.  When  I 
have  concentrated  thy  quality  and  thy  heart  upon 
sight  of  me,  what  hast  thou  to  do  with  supplication  ? 
Shalt  thou  ask  me  to  remove  the  veil  ?  I  have 
removed  it.  Shalt  thou  ask  me  to  veil  myself? 
Then  with  whom  wilt  thou  converse  ?  When  thou 
hast  seen  me,  only  two  petitions  remain  for  thee : 
thou  mayest  ask  me  in  my  absence  to  maintain  thee 
in  my  sight ;  and  thou  mayest  ask  me  when  thou 
seest  me  that  thou  mayest  say  to  a  thing  be  and 
it  shall  be.  Yet  I  give  thee  leave  to  ask  of  me 
when  I  am  absent.  If  thou  canst  calculate,  then 
subtract  the  vision  from  the  absence,  and  whichever 
remains  over,  make  that  prevail  in  the  matter  of 
petition — i.e,  since  petition  is  only  permitted  in 
absence,  if  there  be  more  absence  than  presence,  ask. 
If  I  am  not  absent  when  thou  eatest,  then  I  shall 
save  thee  the  trouble  of  labouring  for  food.  If  I  am 
not  absent  when  thou  sleepest,  I  shall  not  be  absent 
when  thou  wakest.  A  resolve  of  thine  to  keep 
silence  when  thou  seest  me  is  a  screening  ;  how  much 
more  a  resolve  of  thine  to  speak.     Such  resolve  can 


ASCETICISM   LEADING   TO   PANTHEISM        191 

only  come  about  in  absence.     To  no  eye  or  heart  do 
I  appear  but  I  annihilate  it." 

The  revelation  dealing  with  the  screening  of  the 
vision  is  rather  more  mysterious.  "  Ignorance  is  the 
screen  of  vision,  and  knowledge  is  the  screen  of  vision. 
I  am  the  unscreened  outside  and  the  unrevealed 
interior.  Who  knows  the  screen  is  near  the  revela- 
tion. The  screen  is  one,  but  the  causes  which  bring 
it  about  are  many.     They  are  the  specific  screens." 

Just  as  we  find  that  in  the  ideaHsm  of  Kant  space 
and  time  are  shown  to  be  forms  of  thought,  i.e.  to 
exist  for  the  mind  only,  so  our  mystic  thinks  the 
same  of  night  and  day.  "  Eternity  worships  me,  and 
it  is  one  of  my  quahties  ;  and  out  of  its  praise  I  have 
created  the  night  and  the  day ;  I  have  made  them 
curtains  spread  out  over  the  eyes  and  the  thoughts, 
and  over  the  hearts  and  over  the  minds.  Night  and 
day  are  two  curtains  spread  out  over  all  that  I  have 
created,  but  having  chosen  thee  for  myself  I  have 
lifted  those  curtains  in  order  that  thou  mightest  see 
me ;  and  now  that  thou  hast  seen  me,  stand  in  thy 
station  before  me,  and  abide  in  the  vision  of  me ; 
otherwise  thou  shalt  be  snatched  by  every  being.  I 
have  only  raised  the  curtains  in  order  that  thou 
mightest  see  me,  and  that  I  might  strengthen  thee 
for  the  sight  of  the  heavens  splitting,  and  for  the 
sight  of  that  which  descends  how  it  descends,  and 
that  thou  mightest  see  how  that  comes  from  my 
presence  even  as  there  come  night  and  day,  and  all 
that  1  show  unto  thee." 

The    Kantian   doctrine   of  space   and  time  is  ex- 


192    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

pressed  somewhat  more  distinctly  in  another  "  station." 
"  Everything  that  is  on  the  dust  is  from  the  dust ; 
look  then  at  the  dust,  and  thou  shalt  eliminate  that 
which  is  from  it ;  and  shalt  see  that  which  transformed 
it  from  one  individual  in  the  sight  of  the  eyes  to 
another ;  thus  the  individuals  shall  not  distract  thee. 
Take  to  thyself  helpers  for  the  wandering  of  thy  gaze  ; 
and  when  thy  gaze  no  longer  wanders  then  no  helpers 
are  required.  The  dispensing  with  helpers  shall  not 
be  until  there  is  no  time  ;  and  there  shall  be  no  time 
only  when  there  are  no  individuals  ;  and  there  shall 
be  no  individuals  only  when  thou  seest  them  not,  but 
seest  me." 

[The  aspirant,  then,  is  to  direct  his  thoughts  to 
the  matter  and  the  power  which  transforms  it  into 
different  substances  and  individuals  ;  this  transforma- 
tion takes  place  in  time  ;  and  only  when  the  aspirant 
has  forgotten  the  individual  existences,  and  realised 
only  the  transforming  power,  can  he  do  without 
helpers,  i.e.  the  ascetic  practices  which  will  enable 
him  to  reach  what  is  behind  phenomena.] 

The  following  "  station  "  deals  with  "  vicinity,"  i.e. 
what  is  meant  by  being  "near  God,"  an  epithet 
which  in  the  Koran  is  applied  to  a  favoured  class, 
which  includes  the  Christian  Saviour.  It  is  shown 
that  the  notions  of  distance  and  vicinity  in  this  con- 
text have  nothing  to  do  with  space. 

"  He  caused  me  to  understand  vicinity,  and  said  to 
me:  Nothing  is  further  from  me  than  any  other 
thing,  and  nothing  is  nearer  to  me  than  any  other 
thing,  except  as  I  institute  its  nearness  or  farness. 


ASCETICISM   LEADING   TO   PANTHEISM        193 

"  Distance  is  known  to  thee  by  vicinity,  and  vicinity 
is  known  to  thee  by  sensation  ;  the  most  elementary 
acquaintance  with  vicinity  is  thy  perceiving  the 
trace  of  my  sight  in  everything,  so  that  this  affects 
thee  more  than  thy  knowledge  [of  the  thing]. 

"The  vicinity  which  thou  knowest,  as  compared 
with  the  vicinity  which  I  know,  is  like  thy  knowledge 
compared  with  my  knowledge. 

"  Neither  my  vicinity  nor  my  distance  is  known  to 
thee,  nor  my  description  according  as  it  really  is. 

**  I  am  the  near,  yet  not  as  one  thing  is  near  another  ; 
and  the  distant,  yet  not  as  one  thing  is  distant  from 
another. 

"  Thy  nearness  and  thy  farness  are  not  thine  ;  it  is 
I  that  am  the  near  and  the  distant,  whose  nearness 
is  distance  and  whose  distance  is  nearness. 

"  The  nearness  and  the  distance  which  thou  knowest 
are  measured  by  space;  but  I  am  near  and  distant 
without  space. 

,"  I  am  nearer  to  the  tongue  than  its  utterance,  when 
it  utters  ;  whoso  witnesses  me  makes  no  mention,  and 
whoso  mentions  me  witnesses  not. 

"  He  who  witnesses  and  mentions,  if  what  he  wit- 
nesses be  not  real  is  screened  by  what  he  mentions. 

"  I  make  myself  known  to  thee  and  thou  knowest 

me  not — that  is  distance ;  thy  heart  sees  me,  yet  sees 

me   not— that  is  distance ;   thou  perceivest  me,   yet 

perceivest  me  not — that  is  distance.     Thou  describest 

me,  yet  not   according   to   my   description — ^that   is 

distance.     Thou  hearest  my  addressing  thee  from  thy 

heart,  whereas  the  address  is  from  me — that  is  dis- 

13 


194    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

tance  ;  thou  seest  thyself,  whereas  1  am  nearer  to  thee 
than  thy  sight — that  is  distance." 

The  following  is  an  account  of  the  main  doctrine, 
but  rather  obscurely  and  mysteriously  expressed  : 

"  Thou  must  not  go  out  of  thy  house  save  unto 
me ;  thou  shalt  then  be  in  my  protection,  and  I  shall 
be  thy  helper. 

"  I  am  God  ;  thou  canst  not  enter  unto  me  by  bodies, 
nor  perceive  my  knowledge  by  fancies. 

"  Whatsoever   thou  seest  with  thine  eye  and  thy 
heart  of  the  realm  of  the  manifest  and  the  secret,  and 
whose    submission  unto   me  and  humiUation  before 
me,  and  before  the  majesty  of  my  might,  I  have  made 
thee  witness  through  some  knowledge  which  1  have 
established  for  thee,  which  thou  knowest  by  witness- 
ing, not  by  expression — beyond  that  knowledge  I  have 
made  thee  pass,  and  from  other  infinite  cognisances 
and  the  tongues  of  their  utterers,  and  have  opened 
unto   thee  therein  my  gates  which  are  only  entered 
by  him  whose  knowledge  is  strong  enough  to  sustain 
the  knowledge  of  them,  so  that  thou  sustainest  them 
and  not  they  thee ;  by  reason  of  what   I  have  made 
thee   witness  of  them,  and   not   permitted  them  to 
witness  of  thee  ;  and  so  thou  hast  reached  the  bound 
of  the  Presence,  and  the  arrival  of  one  and  another 
has  been  announced :  thereupon  reflect  who  thou  art 
and  whence  thou  hast  entered,  and  what  thou  didst 
know  so  that  thou  couldst  enter,  and  why  thou  didst 
hear  so  that  thou  couldst  sustain. 

"  When  I  shall  cause  thee  to  witness  every  exist- 
ence at  once,  in  one  vision,  then  at  that  station  I  have 


ASCETICISM   LEADING   TO   PANTHEISM        195 

certain  forms,  which  if  thou  knowest,  invoke  me  by 
them  ;  but  if  thou  knowest  them  not,  then  invoke  me 
by  the  pain  of  this  vision  in  thy  troubles. 

*'  The  description  of  this  vision  is  that  thou  shouldst 
see  the  height  and  the  depth  and  the  length  and  the 
breadth,  and  all  that  is  therein,  and  all  whereby  that 
is  in  what  is  manifest  and  abiding  and  subjected  and 
striving,  and  shouldst  witness  the  existence  of  each 
returning  its  gaze  towards  itself,  since  each  particular 
thereof  cannot  advance  except  towards  its  parts, 
and  shouldst  witness  the  places  thereof  whereon  the 
eye  falls,  wherein  existence  establishes  its  hymnody 
directed  towards  me  with  the  eulogies  of  its  praise, 
staring  at  me  with  the  glory-giving  which  distracts 
it  from  everything  else  than  its  continuance  in  its 
devotions  ;  then  when  thou  seest  [the  existences]  with 
their  faces  [so]  turned,  say :  O  thou  who  conquerest 
everything  by  the  appearance  of  thy  sovereignty,  and 
who  appropriatest  everything  by  the  despotism  of  thy 
misfht,  thou  art  the  Powerful  who  canst  not  be  re- 
sisted,  and  canst  not  be  described  ;  and  when  thou 
witnessest  them  staring  in  order  to  give  glory,  then 
say :  O  merciful,  O  pitying  One ;  1  ask  thee  by  thy 
mercy  whereby  thou  hast  established  in  thy  know- 
ledge and  strengthened  and  elevated  unto  thy  mention 
and  raised  the  minds  unto  yearning  after  thee,  and 
whereby  thou  hast  ennobled  the  station  of  whom  thou 
wilt  among  thy  creatures  before  thee. 

"  Knowledge  is  what  thou  feelest,  but  the  realisa- 
tion of  knowledge  is  what  thou  dost  witness. 

"Is  not  the  fact  that  I  have  sent  unto  thee  the 


196    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

sciences  from  the  direction  of  thy  heart  a  withdraw- 
ing of  thee  from  the  general  to  the  special  ?  Is  not 
my  privileging  thee  by  making  myself  known  to  thee, 
so  that  thou  canst  abandon  thy  heart  and  the  sciences 
which  have  appeared  to  thee,  revelation  ?  Does  not 
revelation  mean  that  thou  shouldst  banish  from 
thee  everything  and  the  knowledge  of  everything, 
and  witness  me  in  that  which  I  have  made  thee 
witness  ?  So  that  no  alarmer  alarms  thee  at  that 
time,  neither  does  any  companion  cheer  thee,  whilst 
I  make  thee  witness  and  make  myself  known  unto 
thee,  though  it  were  but  once  in  thy  lifetime  ;  telling 
thee  that  thou  art  my  friend,  inasmuch  as  thou  dost 
negate  everything  by  virtue  of  what  1  have  made 
thee  witness,  so  that  I  become  the  controller  of  thee, 
and  thou  comest  between  me  and  everything,  and 
thou  art  attached  to  me,  whilst  everything  [else]  is 
attached  to  thee,  not  to  me.  And  this  is  the  descrip- 
tion of  my  friends,  and  know  that  thou  art  my  friend, 
and  that  thy  knowledge  is  the  knowledge  of  my 
friendship.  So  commit  unto  me  thy  name  that  I 
may  meet  thee  therewith,  and  set  between  me  and 
thee  no  name  nor  knowledge,  and  discard  all  names 
and  sciences  which  I  display  unto  thee  owing  to  the 
majesty  of  my  vision,  lest  thou  thereby  be  screened 
from  me. 

"  Everything  has  its  sorcery,  and  the  sorcery  of  the 
letters  is  the  names ;  depart  from  the  names,  thou 
shalt  depart  from  the  meanings. 

"  He  caused  me  to  understand  the  command,  and 
said  unto  me :   Execute  what  I  command  thee  and 


ASCETICISM   LEADING   TO   PANTHEISM        197 

wait  not  for  cognisance ;  verily  if  thou  wait  for 
cognisance  of  my  command  thou  shalt  disobey  my 
command. 

"  If  thou  dost  not  execute  my  command  until  the 
cognisance  thereof  appears  to  thee,  thou  obeyest  the 
cognisance  of  the  command,  not  the  command. 

"  Knowest  thou  what  it  is  which  stops  thee  from 
executing  my  command  and  wait  for  the  cognisance 
thereof?  It  is  thy  soul,  which  seeks  knowledge  that 
she  may  be  superior  to  my  decrees,  and  that  she  may 
go  by  her  own  guidance  in  its  paths.  Verily  cog- 
nisance has  ways,  the  ways  valleys,  the  valleys  out- 
lets and  highroads,  and  the  highroads  difference  of 
direction. 

"  Execute  my  command  when  I  command  thee,  and 
ask  not  concerning  the  cognisance  thereof;  even  so 
those  that  are  in  my  presence,  the  angels  of  the 
decrees,  carry  out  what  they  are  commanded  and 
make  no  inquiries  ;  execute  without  inquiry,  and  thou 
shalt  be  of  me  and  I  of  thee. 

"  It  is  not  out  of  grudging  that  I  conceal  from  thee 
cognisance  of  the  command ;  only  cognisance  is  that 
station  of  wisdom  which  I  have  set  for  thee ;  and  if 
I  assent  to  thy  cognisance  of  anything,  I  command 
thee  to  abide  there ;  and  if  thou  abide  not  there, 
thou  disobeyest  me,  because  I  have  made  cognisance 
a  judgment,  and  when  I  show  thee  a  cognisance,  I 
command  thee  to  judge  thereby. 

"  If  I  command  thee,  and  thy  intellect  come  and 
intervene,  then  banish  it,  and  if  thy  heart  come  and 
intervene,  then   dismiss  it,  so   thou  mayest  execute 


198    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM      ^ 

my  command,  and  let  nothing  else  accompany  thee  ;  ; 
for  then  thou  shalt  advance  therein  ;  but  if  anything  ] 
else  accompany  thee,  then  it  will  cause  thee  to  stop  \ 
short  of  it,  for  thy  intellect  will  stay  thee  until  thou 
knowest,  and  only  when  it  knows  does  it  give  prefer- 
ence, and  thy  heart  will  stay  thee,  and  when  it  knows  ; 
it  will  favour."  i 

The  next  translation  is  of  a  highly  mystical  passage  : 

"  Instruction  of  the  Sea. 

"  He   caused   me   to   understand   the   sea,    and   I  ! 

beheld   the   boats  sinking   but  the  planks  escaping.  J 

Then  the  planks  sank,  and  he  said  unto  me.  None  i 
who   sails   escapes.     He    risks    his   life   who    flings 

himself  therein  and  sails  not.     He  perishes  who  sails  ; 

and  risks   not ;  in  risking  there  is   some  safety  ;  for  j 
the  wave  comes  and  raises  what  is  beneath  it,  and  it 

sinks   upon  the  shore.     The  surface  of  the  sea  is  a  | 

light  that  cannot  be  attained  owing  to  the  distance  : 
of  its  path,  and  its  bed  is  darkness  that  cannot  be 
endured  ;  and   between   the   two  are  monsters  from 

which  no  one  is  secure.     Sail  not  on  the  sea  lest  I  j 

screen  thee  by  the  instrument ;  and  fling  not  thyself  j 

therein  lest  I  screen  thee  therewith.     In  the  sea  are  | 

bounds,  and  which  of  them  shall  support  thee?     If  ; 
thou  givest  thyself  to  the  sea  and  art  drowned  there- 
in, thou  shalt  be  like  one  of  its  creatures.     1  should 

deceive   thee    if   I    pointed   thee    towards   any   but  ] 

thyself.     If  thou  perish   in   aught   beside   me   thou  \ 

shalt    remain   even   as   thou    hast   perished   therein.  < 

The  world  is  for  him  whom  I  have  diverted  from  it  | 

and  from  whom  I    have   diverted  it ;  and  the   next  | 


ASCETICISM   LEADING   TO   PANTHEISM        199 

world  is  for  him  towards  whom  I  have  advanced  it, 
together  with  myself." 

It  appears  from  these  quotations  that  the  mysticism 
of  Islam  is  developed  on  lines  of  its  own,  and  has 
only  a  superficial  resemblance  to  other  sorts.  Its 
goal,  Fana,  ''  perdition,"  means  losing  consciousness 
of  all  other  existences  besides  that  of  God  ;  and  this 
goal  seems  so  clearly  suggested  by  the  Koranic  doc- 
trine that  nothing  should  be  associated  with  God, 
that  we  may  even  doubt  the  influence  of  India, 
which  in  its  philosophy  of  Maya  or  "  delusion " 
seems  often  to  run  on  parallel  lines.  The  problem  of 
Indian  philosophy  is,  however,  a  different  one,  being 
suggested  by  the  doctrine  of  transmigration  ;  how  is 
the  soul,  constantly  shifting  from  one  embodiment  to 
another,  to  attain  rest  ?  The  problem  of  Islamic 
mysticism  is :  how  is  the  Moslem  to  fulfil  the 
command  to  associate  nothing  with  God  ?  He  fulfils 
it  in  the  first  place  by  banishing  from  his  mind  all 
desires  except  the  desire  for  God  ;  by  rejecting  and 
contemning  earthly  joys  first,  and  then  heavenly  joys  : 
and  since  Paradise  has  no  attraction  for  him,  he 
speedily  arrives  at  the  conclusion  that  the  ceremonial 
performances  by  which  it  is  to  be  earned  can  have 
only  disciplinary,  at  most  sacramental,  value.  But  he 
is  then  faced  with  the  difficulty  that  his  senses  in  the 
first  place  and  his  intelligence  in  the  second  tell 
him  of  other  things  existing  besides  God  ;  of  various 
phgenomena  and  nolimena.  He  must  then  some- 
how or  other  eliminate  these  also  ;  and  finally  elimi- 
nate   himself,  because  he  must  not  treat  himself  as 


200    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

diiferent   from    God,  since  otherwise  he  will  be   no 
complete  monotheist. 

Now,  what  appears  from  the  treatise  whence  these 
extracts  have  been  taken  is  that  the  author  endeavours 
to  set  forth  matters  of  experience,  propositions  which 
perhaps  convey  a  meaning  to  one  who  has  gone 
through  a  certain  training,  but  which  are  most 
imperfectly  understood  by  others  :  and  it  may  be 
gathered  that  even  with  himself  the  consciousness 
was  not  persistent,  but  occasional.  But  just  as  with 
the  Indian  philosophies  the  goal  w^as  the  same, 
though  the  methods  were  variable,  so  with  the  JNIoslem 
mystics  the  end  was  definite,  though  different  sects 
and  orders  supposed  it  could  be  attained  by  some- 
what different  modes  of  procedure.  Philanthropy 
and  social  reform  seem,  however,  to  have  been  rather 
by-products  of  the  movement  than  to  have  con- 
stituted an  essential  part  of  it.  The  essential  thing 
is  salvation,  for  which,  curiously  enough,  a  term 
signifying  perdition  is  employed. 

Of  sacred  literature  outside  the  region  of  Islam, 
it  is  probable  that  parts  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  bear 
the  closest  resemblance  which  can  be  found  to  the 
esoteric  Sufism  ;  a  question  not  easily  answered  is 
whether  we  have  independent  products  before  us,  or 
whether  the  thoughts  of  Niffari  are  directly  inherited 
from  the  author  of  the  Christian  work. 


LECTURE   VTI 

THE    PHILOSOPHICAL    SUPPLEMENT 

As  "  a  detailed  account  of  everything  "  the  Koran 
might  reasonably  be  expected  to  give  clear  and 
satisfactory  answers  to  those  questions  which  come 
within  religious  metaphysics,  e.g.  responsibility,  and 
the  nature  of  the  soul  and  of  God.  Possibly  a 
consistent  system  on  these  subjects  is  scarcely 
attainable  ;  and  one  of  even  ostensible  consistency 
can  only  be  devised  by  patient  study  and  purely 
objective  speculation.  The  Prophet's  busy  and 
active  life  neither  favoured  nor  even  permitted  such 
processes ;  whence,  when  these  questions  became 
troublesome,  they  had  to  be  answered  as  best  suited 
the  immediate  need.  Thus  the  Prophet's  first  and 
main  message  appears  to  have  been  to  warn  his 
countrymen  of  an  approaching  Day  of  Judgment, 
accompanied  by  the  resurrection  of  the  dead  ;  and, 
like  the  ancient  Pharisees  and  Sadducees,  he  and  they 
appear  to  have  differed  on  the  question  whether  the 
dead  are  or  are  not  to  rise.  It  seems,  however,  clear 
that  if  the  dead  are  to  rise  in  order  to  be  judged. 
Paradise  and  Hell  cannot  follow  immediately  upon 
death ;   the   ultimate   condition    indicated   by   those 

201 


202    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 


two  words  must  come  after  Judgment,  not  before. 
Until,  then,  Moslems  fought  battles  wherem  they 
slew  Unbelievers  and  were  themselves  slain,  there 
was  little  difficulty  in  making  the  dead  unconsciously 
await  the  final  trump,  when  they  were  to  be  raised 
for  judgment ;  but  the  first  of  the  Moslem  battles 
rendered  such  delay  intolerable.  The  martyrs  had 
to  enter  Paradise  at  once,  and  the  dead  Unbelievers 
had  immediately  to  be  convinced  of  their  error. 
Nevertheless,  the  doctrine  of  the  Day  of  Judgment 
was  too  deeply  interwoven  with  Islam  —  being 
mentioned  in  the  familiar  prayer  which  afterwards 
was  placed  at  the  commencement  of  the  Koran — to 
be  abandoned.  Since  men's  natural  beliefs  on  these 
subjects  are  inconsistent  and  contradictory,  possibly 
the  Koran  is  not  thereby  the  less  suited  to  the  | 
religious  needs  of  the  community ;  just  as  the  in-  j 
consistencies  in  the  Homeric  and  Vergilian  Infernos  I 
are  assuredly  what  constitute  their  beauty  and  their  i 
truth.  But  when  it  is  desirable  to  extract  dogma,  in  j 
order  to  know  precisely  what  is  to  be  believed,  and  j 
to  penalise  those  who  hold  erroneous  opinions,  such  i 
inconsistency  is  exceedingly  troublesome.  ! 

Now  the  word  Metaphysics  means  "  after  physics,"  j 
and  it  seems  clear  that  it  is  only  after  some  progress  | 
has  been  made  with  the  physical  sciences  that  meta-  j 
physical  questions  can  be  profitably  studied.  For  \ 
founding  despotisms  no  particular  knowledge  of  \ 
either  appears  to  be  requisite  ;  but  when  an  empire  i 
has  to  be  maintained  on  a  religious  basis,  systematisa-  ] 
tion  becomes  necessary,  and  the  studies  which  should    ^ 


THE   PHILOSOPHICAL   SUPPLEMENT  203 

have  preceded  the  composition  of  the  sacred  book 
cannot  be  permanently  kept  out.  It  was  not,  then, 
the  variant  readings  of  the  Koran,  but  the  rough-and- 
ready  nature  of  its  composition,  which  necessarily 
brought  about  sectarianism.  And  in  the  opinion  of 
competent  authorities  the  sect  which  comes  nearest  to 
the  oriofinal  Islam  is  not  one  of  those  whose  adherents 
can  be  counted  by  millions,  but  one  of  which  there 
are  scanty  relics  in  corners  of  Arabia,  Algeria,  and 
the  Tripolitaine,  whose  very  name  suggests  "going 
out,"  not  remaining  within  the  fold. 

The  scientific  and  philosophical  level  of  the  Koran  - 
appears,  then,  to  be  but  slightly,  if  at  all,  superior  to  o 
that  of  the  pagan  Arabs  ;  it  recommends  the  study 
and  observation  of  nature,  but  the  author  clearly  had  / 
no   idea   that   nature  had    ever    been   methodically  \ 
studied,  and   his   own   observations  are  elementary.  ' 
The   sun  rises  over  people  who  are  without  shelter 
from  it,  and  sinks  into  a  muddy  well  or  a  hot  spring   . 
— for   it   is   uncertain   how   the    passage   should   be  < 
read ;  the  mountains  serve  as  pillars  to  prevent  the  ( 
earth  from  swaying  ;  domestic  animals  are   of  four/ 
sorts — sheep,  oxen,  goats,  and  camels.     There  are  two 
seas,  one  sweet  and  the  other  salt ;  there  is  a  barrier 
between   them    which   prevents   their  mixing.     The 
shooting  stars  are  flames  aimed  at  rebellious  jinn  who 
eavesdrop   at   the    heavenly   council.      Though    the 
existence  of  other   gods   than   Allah  is  vehemently 
denied,    nevertheless   these  non-existent  beings   will 
repudiate  their  worshippers  on  the  Day  of  Judgment. 
Birds  and  insects  not  only  are  credited  with  uttering 


204    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

the  praises  of  God,  which  might  well  be  regarded  as 
a  poetical  expression,  but  they  are  introduced  into 
narratives  as  reasoning  and  speaking,  in  a  way  which 
has  since  given  serious  trouble  ;  it  has  been  argued 
from  the  Koran  that  even  mountains  probably  have 
thought  and  reason,  but  for  some  cause  have 
ordinarily  been  deprived  of  speech,  and  that  beasts 
and  birds  are  responsible  agents.  So  we  fancy  that 
the  doctrine  of  the  Koran  according  to  which  Un- 
believers' hearts  are  as  hard  as  stone  or  even  harder 
has  led  to  the  belief  that  this  is  physically  the  case. 
The  historian  Tabari  gravely  records  how,  when  the 
heart  of  the  insurgent  Shabib  was  taken  out,  it 
rebounded  as  high  as  a  man's  stature  when  flung 
on  the  ground,  so  hard-hearted  was  this  insurgent.^ 

Since  the  Koran  claims  to  give  an  exhaustive 
account  of  everything,  it  was  probably  entirely 
against  the  Prophet's  wish  that  it  should  be 
supplemented  by  any  other  sort  of  knowledge,  and 
his  attitude  even  to  the  poets  was  hostile.  As  we 
have  repeatedly  seen,  the  existence  of  the  Koran  in 
his  time  was  more  like  that  of  a  running  stream  than 
of  an  accumulated  mass  ;  if  difficulties  arose,  they 
could  be  solved  by  the  summary  process  of  erasing 
one  verse  and  substituting  another.  There  is  much 
homily,  but  no  dogmatic  system ;  even  on  the 
question  whether  the  beings  worshipped  in  addition 
to  Allah  have  any  existence  the  Koran  is  self-con- 
tradictory ;  if  they  are  merely  names  coined  by  your 
ancestors,  they  will  not  be  in  a  position  to  repudi- 

1  ii.  976. 


THE   PHILOSOPHICAL  SUPPLEMENT  205 

ate  their  worshippers.  On  the  question  whether  all 
Moslems  will  be  saved  or  whether  only  JNIoslems 
will  be  saved,  there  are  similarly  contradictory  state- 
ments :  varying  according  to  the  Prophet's  mood 
or  political  needs.  By  the  end  of  three  centuries 
we  find  a  very  different  state  of  affairs.  All  these 
questions  have  been  posed  and  a  definite  reply  given 
as  the  orthodox  answer ;  in  the  treatise  of  Abu'l- 
Hasan  al-Ash'ari,  which  bears  date  about  that  time, 
we  have  a  series  of  results  which  to  this  day  are 
accepted  as  the  dogma  of  Islam  by  the  bulk  of  its 
adherents. 

Now,  it  is  noticeable  that  the  literature  called 
Arabian  philosophy  is  mostly  later  than  this  date  ;  the 
chief  translators  of  Greek  philosophical  works  and 
the  chief  reproductions  of  those  treatises  belong  to 
the  fourth,  fifth,  and  sixth  centuries.  The  discussions 
whereby  the  ultimate  orthodoxy  was  evolved  there- 
fore took  place  at  a  period  earlier  than  the  whole- 
sale introduction  of  Greek  philosophy  into  INIoslem 
countries.  When  it  was  introduced  in  this  fashion 
it  had  the  reputation  of  unorthodoxy  ;  to  possess  the 
works  of  Aristotle  or  of  Avicenna  was  rarely  safe  ; 
philosophers  were  denounced  from  the  pulpit,  and 
pious  sovereigns  made  holocausts  of  their  works. 
Hence  the  influence  of  Greek  thought  in  building 
up  the  dogmatics  of  Islam,  though  considerable, 
is  likely  to  have  been  in  the  main  indirect. 

The  works  in  which  the  few  great  thinkers  of 
mankind  have  stated  their  views  are  in  most  cases 
difficult ;    what  suits  the   public   far   more   is   some 


206    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

compendium  or  summary.  In  our  time  the  number 
of  persons  who  have  read  the  Origin  of  Species  bears 
no  proportion  to  the  number  of  Darwinians ;  and 
similarly  in  ancient  times  the  number  of  persons 
whose  thoughts  were  guided  by  the  discoveries  of 
Plato  and  Aristotle  vastly  exceeded  that  of  those 
who  had  read  their  works,  or,  indeed,  heard  their 
names.  Prior  to  the  rise  of  Islam  translations  of 
Greek  philosophical  works  had  been  issued  in  the 
languages  of  the  nations  which  shortly  after  its  rise 
were  to  be  incorporated  in  its  empire — the  Syrians 
and  the  Persians ;  but  the  ideas  of  the  Greeks  had 
been  current  among  the  peoples  w^ith  whom  the 
Arabs  associated  long  before.  Uneducated  as  was 
the  author  of  the  Koran,  it  is  clear  that  even  that 
work  contains  traces  of  Aristotelian  thought.  When 
Satan  refuses  to  bow  down  before  Adam  on  the 
ground  that  he  had  been  created  of  fire,  whereas 
Adam  had  been  created  of  clay,  the  underlying 
thought  is  that  of  Aristotle's  Physics :  wherein  the 
proof  is  given  that  fire  is  more  honourable  than  earth, 
because  in  the  hierarchy  of  the  elements  fire  is  at 
the  top,  whereas  earth  is  at  the  bottom.  Similarly, 
though  the  Prophet  is  unlikely  to  have  heard  of  the 
Odyssey,  we  are  justified  in  finding  an  allusion  to 
Penelope  in  the  woman  who  undid  her  spinning  after 
it  had  been  wound. ^  Such  discoveries  as  Aristotle's 
analysis  of  the  reasoning  process  become  common 
property,  and  influence  the  thought  of  persons  who 
are  quite  unacquainted  with  their  origin ;   but  that 

^  Surah  xvi.  94. 


THE   PHILOSOPHICAL   SUPPLEMENT  207 

origin  not  having  been  forgotten,  under  certain 
conditions  persons  are  likely  to  arise  who  will  go 
back  to  the  source. 

Towards  the  end  of  the  second  century  there  arose 
sovereigns  who  had  a  genuine  desire  to  possess 
accurate  translations  of  Greek  philosophical  master- 
pieces ;  and  when  such  translations  were  published, 
there  were  Moslems  who  studied  them  with  great  care. 
A  philosopher  of  the  early  third  century  is  charged 
with  substituting  for  the  Koran  Aristotle's  Physics, 
de  Generatione  et  Coi^ruptione,  and  Logic ;  with 
spending  his  time  on  those  studies,  and  neglecting 
his  fasts.^  One  of  the  friends  of  Jahiz,  who  lived  at 
that  time,  had  a  slave-girl  who  had  mastered  the 
whole  of  Euclid,  whereas  some  Moslem  men  were 
unable  to  master  a  single  proposition.^  In  the  middle 
of  the  third  century  the  study  of  Greek  geometry  is 
recommended  as  necessary  for  the  sharpening  of  the 
intellect,  and  there  were  both  Christian  and  Moslem 
teachers  of  it.  The  ultra  -  orthodox  regarded  it  as 
heretical  and  dangerous.^  There  is  reason  for 
thinking  that  even  towards  the  end  of  the  first 
century  Greek  authorities  on  various  forms  of  the 
black  art  had  obtained  access  to  the  Moslem 
court.  But  the  doctrine  that  only  the  Koran  might 
be  studied,  which,  as  we  have  seen,  at  first  pre- 
vailed, probably  would  not  have  given  way  except 
to  so  tremendous  a  breach  in  the  continuity  of 
Islam   as   was   brought   about    by   the   transference 

1  Mukhtalif  al-Hadlth,  p.  67.  ^  Hayawan  i.  28. 

3  Yakut  ii.  45. 


208    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

of  the  capital  to  the  new  city  on  the  Tigris, 
and  the  consequent  inheritance  by  the  Caliphs  of 
the  traditions  of  the  old  Persian  kings.  Baghdad, 
growing  with  phenomenal  rapidity,  speedily  attracted 
to  itself  all  that  was  in  any  sense  remarkable  in  the 
Islamic  empire.  Shafi'i,  who  lived  in  the  second  half 
of  the  second  century,  when  the  city  was  still  new, 
said  that  Baghdad  was  the  world  ;  ^  all  else  was  the 
country,  or,  as  he  expressed  it,  the  desert.  He  who 
had  not  seen  Baghdad  had  not  seen  mankind.  It 
was  there  that  INIoslem  literature  began,  and  this  also 
grew  no  less  rapidly  than  the  city;  there  were 
authors  of  the  third  century  whose  volumes  might  be 
counted  by  the  hundred  or  more.  Much  of  their 
matter  was  either  derived  from  or  suggested  by 
translations  from  other  languages.  But  the  main 
lines  of  Moslem  heresies  had  been  marked  out  before 
the  foundation  of  that  metropolis,  whence  the  influ- 
ence of  philosophy  upon  them  must,  as  has  been  seen, 
have  been  indirect,  i.e,  due  to  those  results  which 
had  become  the  common  property  of  mankind. 

For  lack  of  any  other  matter  to  be  read  the 
first  Moslems  conned  the  Koran ;  and  since  political 
meetings  could  be  explained  to  the  authorities  as 
Bible-classes,  it  is  probable  that  gatherings  for  the 
study  of  the  sacred  volume  were  no  less  common 
than  private  study.  The  sects,  called  by  the  orthodox 
"  the  people  of  fancies,"  when  they  had  no  intention 
of  breaking  with  Islam,  found  in  the  sacred  volume 
the  basis  of  their  systems  ;  even  the  doctrine  that  All 

1  K.  K.  ii.  49. 


THE   PHILOSOPHICAL  SUPPLEMENT  209 

was  an  incarnation  of  the  divine  being,  held  by  a  sect 
called  the  Saba'is,  whom  Ali  himself  condemned  to 
the  stake,  could  and  probably  did  cite  a  text  of  the 
Koran  wherein  the  adjective  Ali,  "  sublime,"  is  applied 
to  Allah.  The  fanatics  called  Khawarij,  whose  main 
doctrine  was  that  the  evil-doer  was  an  Unbeliever, 
and  that  in  consequence  the  subject  had  a  right  to 
revolt  against  a  monarch  who  did  wrong,  were  firm 
upholders  of  the  Koran.  When  they  split  into  par- 
ties, one  maintaining  that  the  wives  and  children  of 
the  unorthodox  (in  their  sense)  should  be  massacred, 
the  other  disapproving  of  this  course,  each  party 
based  its  case  on  Koranic  texts.  There  is  no  reason 
for  supposing  that  they  did  otherwise  than  follow 
their  lights ;  but  very  much  depended  on  the  texts 
which  they  treated  as  "  The  Mother  of  the  Book,"  i.e. 
the  principles  according  to  which  the  other  texts 
should  be  interpreted.  As  they  studied  the  sacred 
volume  questions  of  all  sorts  suggested  themselves  to 
the  intelligent ;  and  the  origin  of  all  the  sects  appears 
to  have  been  discoveries  made  by  the  pious  in  the 
course  of  their  perusal. 

Our  authorities  would  have  us  believe  that  the 
discussion  of  religious  metaphysics  went  back  even  to 
the  Prophet's  time,  and  quote  his  opinions  on  the 
subject  of  sects  which,  we  fancy,  cannot  in  his  day 
have  had  any  conscious  or  recognised  existence.  But 
though  these  stories  appear  to  be  fables,  we  cannot 
easily  shake  the  evidence  which  ascribes  to  many  of 
the  sects  very  high  antiquity.     A  man  who  was  born 

in  the  year  9  a.h.,  and  whose  mother  was  charged  with 

14 


i 


210    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

acting  as  mischief-maker  between  the  Prophet's  wives, 
and  was  executed  by  him  in  consequence,  is  said  to 
have  been  an  adept  in  the  arguments  of  the  Mu'tazils 
or  behevers  in  the  freedom  of  the  will,  to  which  sect 
he  belonged.^  Our  earliest  collection  of  traditions, 
the  author  of  which  died  in  the  year  179,  contains  a 
saying  of  the  Prophet  concerning  these  heretics  ;  and 
the  pious  Caliph  Omar  II.,  who  died  just  at  the  end 
of  the  first  century  of  Islam,  is  quoted  in  the  same 
collection  as  consulting  a  jurist  on  the  subject  of  the 
same  heretics,  and  agreeing  that  the  right  course  to 
pursue  with  them  was  to  summon  them  to  repent, 
and,  in  the  event  of  their  declining,  to  put  them  to  the 
sword.^  It  is  difficult  to  reject  the  story,  since  the 
jurist  consulted  by  Omar  II.  was  the  uncle  of  Malik 
himself.  And  before  the  first  half  of  the  third 
century  was  finished,  the  refutation  of  heretics  had 
become  a  familiar  subject.^ 

If  we  may  believe  the  chronicles,  the  theory  of  the 
pious  Omar  II.  that  Believers  in  the  Freedom  of  the 
Will  should  be  summoned  to  repent,  and  in  case  of 
their  refusing  should  be  put  to  death,  was  actually 
put  in  force  by  his  successors.  The  act  whereby  his 
successor  Hisham  was  most  likely  to  win  the  favour 
of  God  was,  according  to  one  of  his  contemporaries, 
that  he  slaughtered  or  banished  these  heretics.^  A 
specimen  of  his  method  is  recorded.  One  Ghailan  had 
made  himself  conspicuous  as  a  heresiarch.  He  is 
summoned  to  the  presence  of  the  Caliph,  and  con- 

1  Aghani  xvii.  95.  ^  Muwattaj  ed.  Zurkani,  iii.  83. 

3  Jahiz,  Hayawan  i.  93.  ^  Tabarl  ii.  1777. 


THE   PHILOSOPHICAL   SUPPLEMENT  211 

fronted  with  an  orthodox  theologian.  He  asks: 
Does  God  will  that  He  should  be  disobeyed  ?  The 
orthodox  theologian  replies  by  a  counter-question  : 
Is  God  disobeyed  against  His  will?  Ghailan  hesi- 
tates for  a  reply ;  and  the  Caliph  orders  his  hands 
and  feet  to  be  amputated.  During  the  second 
century,  though  the  third  Yazld,  whose  reign  was 
ephemeral,  belonged  to  the  Kadaris  or  Believers  in 
the  Freedom  of  the  Will,  and  chose  a  successor  in 
accordance  with  his  co-religionists'  advice,  this  sect 
remained  highly  unpopular ;  to  say  a  man  belonged 
to  it  was  in  the  year  126  sufficient  to  make  the  mob 
tear  him  in  pieces.^  A  jurist  who  died  in  198 
formulated  the  opinion  that  one  who  asserted  the 
Creation  of  the  Koran — a  shibboleth  of  the  sect — 
should  be  decapitated  and  his  body  thrown  into  the 
Tigris.' 

It  will  be  seen  from  this  that  the  record  of  Islam 
for  religious  persecution  in  the  case  of  sects  which  all 
claimed  to  be  Mohammedan  at  times  by  no  means 
fell  short  of  that  which  characterised  mediseval 
Christianity.  And  neither  the  Umayyads  nor  the 
Abbasids  were  specially  notorious  for  fanaticism.  A 
historian  of  the  sects  who  writes  early  in  the  fifth 
century  tells  us  that  by  then  sectarianism  had 
acquired  a  sort  of  legal  status.  The  sectarian  was  to 
be  allowed  to  be  buried  in  a  Moslem  cemetery ;  he 
was  to  receive  his  share  of  the  booty  in  war ;  and  he 
was  to  be  allowed  to  pray  in  a  mosque.  On  the 
other  hand,  no  prayer  was  to  be  said  over  him  or 

1  Tabarl  ii.  1828.  2  Tabakat  al-Huffaz  i.  302. 


212    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

behind  him ;  food  slaughtered  by  him  was  to  be 
unlawful ;  nor  was  there  to  be  any  jus  connubii 
between  him  and  the  orthodox.^  In  some  ways, 
then,  the  heretic  was  to  be  inferior  to  the  Jew  or 
Christian,  in  others  superior.  Some  rulers  assimilated 
them  altogether  to  the  tolerated  cults.^ 

What  strikes  us  as  noteworthy  in  the  case  of  the 
particular  heresy  called  Kadariyyah,  or  belief  in  the 
freedom  of  the  will,  is  that  unlike  some  others  its 
connection  with  politics  appears  to  have  been  slight. 
Where  the  heretic  disallowed  the  claim  of  a  sovereign, 
the  reasons  for  persecuting  him  were  obvious ;  for  no 
reliance  could  be  placed  on  his  allegiance.  He  was 
a  member  of  a  conspiracy  against  the  existing  regime. 
But  persecution  merely  on  account  of  dogma  un- 
connected with  politics  is  less  easy  to  understand  in 
the  case  of  a  system  which  to  some  extent  tolerated 
disagreement  with  itself. 

In  several  other  cases  the  supposed  inventors  of 
heretical  opinions  are  placed  at  dates  which  seem  to 
exclude  their  having  been  directly  influenced  by 
Greek  philosophy.  The  origins  of  theological  dis- 
cussions are  connected  by  the  historians  not  with 
discussions  with  Unbelievers,  but  with  the  civil  wars 
which  broke  out  fiercely  before  the  jubilee  of  the 
Migration.  The  fact  clearly  appeared  that  persons 
whose  antecedents  would  argue  a  high  degree  of 
saintliness  were  found  in  opposing  camps.  The 
Prophet's  favourite  wife  went  to  war  with  the 
husband  of  the  Prophet's  daughter,  and  the  foremost 

1  'Abd  al-Kahir,  p.  1 1 .  '^  Letters  of  Khwarizmi. 


THE   PHILOSOPHICAL  SUPPLEMENT  213 

champion  of  Islam.  What  was  forcibly  brought 
home  by  these  events  was  that  "  Believer "  and 
*'  virtuous  "  could  scarcely  be  regarded  as  convertible 
terms :  for  on  the  one  hand  it  would  be  hard  to  deny 
that  Ali  and  'A'ishah  were  Believers ;  on  the  other 
hand,  where  parties  resort  to  the  decision  of  the 
battle-field,  they  are  intentionally  aiming  at  each 
other's  death.  The  Koran  is  so  emphatic  in  its 
making  Hell-Fire  the  eternal  doom  of  one  who 
intentionally  kills  a  Believer,^  that  these  civil  wars 
occasioned  the  gravest  theological  difficulties  to  those 
who  regarded  the  Book  as  infallible.  On  the  one 
hand,  these  heroes  and  heroines  were  certainly 
Believers :  on  the  other  hand,  they  had  certainly  led 
armies  against  Believers  and  left  some  slain  on  the 
field.  The  question  how  far  their  future,  and  indeed 
their  status  in  this  life,  was  alFected  by  their  having 
aimed  at  the  unpardonable  offence  of  compassing  the 
death  of  Moslems  suggested  itself  at  once.  And  the  ' 
individual  who  is  perhaps  most  usually  regarded  as 
the  founder  of  Mu'tazilism,  and  whose  death  is  placed 
in  the  year  131,  i.e,  just  at  the  termination  of  the 
Umayyad  period,  made  what  might  seem  a  valu- 
able suggestion  for  dealing  with  this  difficulty.  By 
capital  offences  the  Moslem  did  not,  as  the  sect 
called  Kharijis  ordinarily  taught,  become  an  Un- 
believer ;  he  entered  an  intermediate  state,  in  which 
he  forfeited  his  claim  to  the  title  Believer  without 
earning  the  other.  And  this  opinion  was  regarded 
as  characteristic  of  the  school. 

1  iv.  92. 


214    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

The  name  ''  Mu'tazil,"  by  which  this  school  is  most 
commonly  known,  is  identical  with  the  word  for 
"neutral,"  used  repeatedly  of  those  who  kept  out 
of  the  civil  wars  and  sided  with  neither  party.^  The 
name  may  then  in  origin  be  a  political  one;  more 
probably,  however,  it  is  taken  from  a  passage  in  the 
Koran  where  Abraham  says  he  will  keep  away  or 
withdraw  from  the  pagans  and  what  they  associate 
with  God.  The  Mu'tazils  are  otherwise  known  to 
have  called  themselves  the  "people  of  monotheism 
and  justice."  By  justice  they  meant  that  in  their 
system  God  escaped  the  charge  of  ordaining  that 
men  should  disobey  Him  and  punishing  them  for 
doing  so ;  but  their  claim  to  monotheism  is  less 
clear,  since  their  opponents  could  with  some  show  of 
justice  call  them  the  Mazdians  of  Islam,  inasmuch 
as  they  postulated  a  power  that  was  co-ordinate 
with  God,  or  at  any  rate  restricted  the  arbitrary 
power  which  the  others  assigned  Him.  It  does  not 
seem  possible  to  look  for  the  source  of  these  and 
similar  names  outside  Islam  with  any  chance  of 
success ;  whence  it  would  appear  that  the  problems 
originated  in  the  study  of  the  sacred  volume,  which 
professed  to  contain  the  answer  to  all  questions  on 
all  subjects,  and  certainly  approaches  this  particular 
problem  more  than  once.  What  we  are  at  liberty 
to  suppose  is  that  some  help  for  pursuing  the  study 
was  obtained  from  outside,  just  as  some  suggestions 
for  the  grammatical  study  of  the  Koran  were  certainly 
obtained  from  Syrians,  though  never  acknowledged. 

1  Tabari  i.  3342,  4,  9 ;  3427,  etc. 


THE   PHILOSOPHICAL   SUPPLEMENT  215 

Here,  too,  as  in  the  case  of  jurisprudence,  the 
debate  precedes  the  treatise.  The  mosques,  where 
any  teacher  could  form  his  circle,  served  as  debating- 
rooms,  where  questions  could  be  asked  and  opinions 
be  formulated. 

One  of  those  who  attended  these  discussions  has 
left  us  a  notice  of  some  that  he  heard.  The  ques- 
tioning reminds  us  of  the  Socratic  dialogues ;  the 
able  questioner  could  reduce  the  opponent  to  silence. 
The  Mu'tazils  asserted  that  the  epithet  "  hearing " 
applied  to  the  Deity  meant  "  knowing  "  ;  the  Koranic 
text  was  quoted :  "  Verily  God  has  heard  the  speech 
of  those  who  said,"  and  the  question  was  asked  :  Had 
God  heard  it  before  they  said  it  ?  The  reply  was 
in  the  negative.  But  did  God  know  it  before  they 
said  it  ?  The  reply  was  affirmative.  The  questioner 
then  asked  whether  that  did  not  prove  that  the 
word  "hear"  in  this  text  meant  something  other 
than  know  ?  To  this  no  answer  could  be  given.  The 
reporter  of  this  debate  says  that  he  asked  these 
reasoners  why  when  they  were  thus  convicted  of 
error  they  did  not  revise  their  opinions,  since  they 
all  claimed  that  reason  should  be  followed  whitherso- 
ever it  led.  He  was  told  that  if  they  allowed  them- 
selves to  be  convinced  they  would  find  themselves 
changing  their  opinions  many  times  a  day.  The 
hearer's  conclusion  was  naturally  very  unfavourable 
to  the  debaters,  since  they  were  not  advancing  upon 
a  scientific  road,  but  merely  defending  shibboleths ; 
and  he  held  with  some  show  of  justice  that  it  was 
better   in  that  case   to   follow   the   opinions   of  the 


/    ,1 


216    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

ancients,  and  especially  the  traditions  of  the  Prophet. 
And  he  urges  with  some  reason  against  the  philo- 
sophical schools  that  their  results  exhibit  no  con- 
sistency ;  the  various  sects  of  Mu*tazils  charge  each 
other  with  unbelief  just  as  the  orthodox  charge  them 
all  with  it.  Yet  in  the  case  of  the  real  sciences  every- 
one says  the  same.  All  calculators  are  agreed  as  to 
their  sums ;  all  physicians  are  agreed  as  to  the  treat- 
ment of  the  same  maladies. 

Nevertheless,  it  is  probable  that  these  debates  were 
far  from  ineffective,  at  any  rate  in  guiding  opinion 
and  winning  adherents.  In  the  story  quoted  the 
narrator  ascribes  his  own  conversion  to  orthodoxy  to 
his  witnessing  the  nonplussing  of  a  Mu'tazil.  And 
since  Mu'tazilism  represents  at  least  to  a  moderate 
extent  freedom  of  thought,  it  is  not  unnatural  that 
the  ablest  Moslem  thinkers  of  the  early  centuries 
belonged  to  one  of  its  branches.  Indeed,  in  the 
biography  of  Abu'l-Hasan  al-Ash'ari,  who  has  the 
reputation  of  having  won  the  case  for  orthodoxy,  it 
is  granted  that  the  orthodox  could  not  ordinarily 
produce  any  debater  who  could  hold  his  own  against 
the  Mu'tazils.  The  biographer  supposes  that  the 
temporary  victory  of  Mu'tazilism  in  the  early  third 
century  was  owing  to  the  fact  that  the  orthodox 
party  produced  martyrs,  but  not  debaters ;  not 
because  the  orthodox  were  incompetent  reasoners, 
but  because  they  regarded  it  as  improper  to  talk  to 
the  unorthodox  or  share  a  carpet  with  them.  Abu'l- 
Hasan  al-Ash'arl,  having,  indeed,  special  authorisa- 
tion,   overcame    this    prejudice    and    defeated    the 


THE   PHILOSOPHICAL   SUPPLEMENT  237 

unorthodox  on  their  own  ground.  Nevertheless, 
there  was  occasional  recrudescence  of  Mu'tazil 
opinions.  One  of  the  most  famous  of  ministers  and 
scholars,  the  Sahib  Ibn  'Abbad,  belonged  to  their 
school.  In  the  fifth  century  a  vizier  of  the  Seljuk 
Sultan,  who  followed  the  same  system,  was  strong 
enough  to  introduce  the  practice  of  cursing  the  name 
of  Abu'l- Hasan  al-Ash*ari  in  the  Friday  sermon,  an 
honour  which  had  once  fallen  to  Ali ;  and  even 
to  start  a  general  persecution  of  Ash'arites,  which 
was  shortly  afterwards  followed  by  a  counter-persecu- 
tion, when  an  orthodox  vizier  had  been  installed.  It 
is  not  in  favour  of  these  supposed  freethinkers  that, 
on  the  occasions  when  they  obtained  political  power, 
they  should  have  exhibited  gross  intolerance  towards 
their  opponents ;  but  it  is  a  mistake  to  suppose  that 
in  this  matter  one  sect  is  much  better  than  another. 

That  the  philosophical  study  of  the  Koran,  in  the 
sense  of  free  speculation  on  its  doctrines  and  their 
ostensible  basis,  would  lead  some  minds  to  scepticism 
and  even  atheism  might  be  expected  a  priori ;  but 
naturally  such  conclusions  as  these  were  ordinarily  so 
dangerous  that  the  inquirers  would  keep  them  to 
themselves.  It  is,  indeed,  asserted  by  the  historian  of 
the  sects  that  the  Carmathians,  or,  as  he  calls  them, 
the  Bdtinis,  who  for  some  fifty  years  were  the  terror 
of  the  pilgrims,  were  actually  atheists  ;  and  he  quotes 
a  letter  supposed  to  be  addressed  by  one  of  their 
leaders  to  another,  in  which  the  prophets  and  their 
codes  are  criticised  in  the  style  to  which  we  are 
accustomed  in  the  publications  of  the  Rational  Press 


218    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

Association.  Mohammed  in  particular  is  made  out 
to  have  been  a  shrewd  adventurer  who  persuaded  his 
followers  to  pay  ready  money  in  the  shape  of  their 
goods  and  lives,  while  he  postponed  payment  which 
was  to  take  the  form  of  the  Garden  of  Dehght.  This 
sect,  he  asserts,  declared  Paradise  was  to  be  found  in 
this  world  only,  and,  indeed,  in  the  shape  of  sensual 
pleasures ;  Hell,  on  the  other  hand,  was  to  be  found 
in  the  religious  observances  which  the  Moslem  code 
enjoined.  This  society,  which  had  secret  agents  in 
various  parts  of  the  Moslem  world,  endeavoured  to 
win  followers  by  playing  on  the  weakness  of  the 
particular  Moslem  with  whom  they  came  in  contact, 
and,  having  found  somewhere  a  rift  in  his  orthodoxy, 
endeavoured  to  widen  it.  Of  course  we  cannot 
accept  the  account  of  the  system  given  by  an  enemy, 
who  acknowledges  that  it  was  esoteric,  not  revealed 
except  to  persons  who,  after  probation,  and  before  it 
was  disclosed  to  them,  were  made  to  swear  that  they 
would  not  reveal  it ;  but  his  quotations  from  their 
literature  at  any  rate  show  that  there  were  persons 
even  in  the  early  centuries  of  Islam  who  had  the 
hardihood  to  break  away  from  the  Koran,  without 
substituting  any  other  form  of  revelation  for  it. 

The  great  bulk  of  the  sects,  however,  by  no  means 
did  this.  They  all  accepted  the  sacred  book  as  of 
paramount  authority,  and  quoted  it  in  defence  of  all 
their  dogmas.  And  a  Christian  polemical  writer  has 
with  justice  called  attention  to  the  inconsistency  of  the 
Shi'ah  in  accepting  the  Koran  as  genuine  when  it  was 
known  to  have  been  collected  by  sovereigns  whom 


THE   PHILOSOPHICAL   SUPPLEMENT  219 

they  brand  as  wicked  usurpers,  who  did  not  even 
accept  the  copy  which  Ali  possessed  as  orthodox. 
Probably  greater  inconveniences  would  result  if  they 
were  to  abandon  it.  And  it  is  probable  that  all 
accepted  the  miracle  of  the  Koran,  in  some  sense  or 
other.  The  difficulty,  however,  of  treating  the  literary 
style  as  miraculous  was  found  appalling,  and  many 
had  to  retreat  on  the  miracle  which  lay  in  the  matter 
which  the  Prophet  communicated  being  unknown  to 
him  through  any  ordinary  channels  ;  but  even  this 
doctrine  involved  implicit  belief  in  the  accuracy  of 
tradition,  which  many  thinkers  impugned.  Indeed, 
when  the  controversy  of  Islam  was  practically  closed, 
towards  the  beginning  of  its  fourth  century,  free- 
thinking  was  identified  with  the  abandonment  of 
tradition.  The  theologian  who  finally  won  the  case 
for  what  has  since  been  orthodoxy,  Abu'l-Hasan 
al-Ash'ari,  after  having  for  forty  years  been  un- 
orthodox— a  Mu*tazil, — was  visited  by  the  Prophet 
in  a  dream,  who  told  him  to  undertake  the  defence 
of  the  sunnah  ;  and  in  consequence  this  theologian 
made  a  pile  of  the  metaphysical  works  which  he 
possessed,  and  returned  to  the  study  of  tradition. 
He  mounted  the  pulpit  in  the  mosque  of  Basrah, 
divested  himself  of  his  robe,  and  declared  that  he 
divested  himself  of  his  errors  in  the  same  way. 

The  fact  that  the  command  which  he  received 
from  the  Prophet  was  to  write  books  in  defence  of 
orthodoxy  shows  a  considerable  advance  during  these 
three  hundred  years  in  controversial  methods.  The 
command  which   the  Prophet  himself  received  and 


220    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

delivered   was   to    compel  '  agreement  by   far   more 
forcible  methods. 

Since  the  time  of  this  personage,  Abu'l-Hasan 
al-Ash'ari,  orthodox  Islam  is  called  after  his  name  ; 
the  Sunnites  should  also  be  Ash'arites.  Not  all  his 
three  hundred  works  appear  to  be  preserved ;  but 
one  which  contains  an  epitome  of  his  controversies 
exists,  and  has  recently  been  printed  at  Hyderabad. 
Orthodox  theology  after  his  time  largely  consists  in 
defending  his  opinions  ;  and  the  increasing  knowledge 
of  Greek  philosophy  which  subsequent  centuries 
brought  caused  further  objections  to  be  raised,  and 
some  fresh  solutions  of  metaphysical  puzzles  to  be 
invented.  His  manuals,  as  often  happens,  gave  way 
to  newer  compendia  of  the  system.  Yet  the  dogmas 
formulated  by  him  appear  to  have  remained  un- 
altered ;  and  from  his  time  the  number  of  recognised 
sects  seems  scarcely  to  have  been  increased.  The 
study  of  sectarian  opinions  and  of  the  correct  mode 
of  dealing  with  them  gradually  stereotyped  into  an 
unalterable  science. 

The  examination  of  the  ideas  which  went  to  make 
up  Islam  did  not,  then,  commence  with  the  period  of 
written  literature,  but  rather  that  written  literature 
represents  the  outcome  of  the  studies  of  a  hundred 
and  twenty  years,  if  we  date  from  the  time  when  the 
Koran  was  completed  and  assumed  its  ultimate  form. 
Since  that  work  claimed  to  give  an  explanation  of 
everything,  as  each  philosophical  question  was  posed 
the  students  searched  the  sacred  volume  to  discover 
what  its  reply  was ;  and  it  clearly  was  made  to  reply 


THE   PHILOSOPHICAL   SUPPLEMENT  221 

to  questions  which  had  not  been  asked  of  its  author. 
A  question  which  occupied  the  Greek  philosophers 
was  whether  the  non-existent  could  be  said  to  be. 
And  according  to  our  answer  to  that  question  we 
shall  decide  whether  creation  means  making  out  of 
nothing,  or  making  out  of  something.  The  Koran 
is  found  to  reply  to  this  question  when  the  Deity 
says  to  Zachariah,  "We  created  thee  before  when 
thou  wast  nothing." 

Against  this  simple  answer  it  would  also  be  possible 
to  quote  the   sacred   volume   for  the  assertion  that 
man  was  created  from  clay,  and  it  could  scarcely  be 
asserted   that  clay  was  nothing.      And  this  pheno- 
menon being  found  in  the  case  of  practically  every 
controversy,    one   possible    method    of    obtaining   a 
peaceful  solution  was  to  admit  that  both  parties  were 
right.     And   this  view  was  actually   maintained  by 
one  philosopher,  'Ubaidallah  b.   al-Hasan,  who  was 
kadi  or  judge  of  Basrah  in  the  year  158  a.h.,  and 
therefore  early  among  the  metaphysical  speculators. 
He  found  the  Koran  contained  texts  which  were  in 
favour  of  free  will,  and  others  in  favour  of  fatalism : 
he  held  that  both  views  were  correct.     He  thought 
a  Moslem  adulterer  might  be  called  an  unbeliever  or 
a  behever  or  a  hypocrite  or  a  pagan ;  since  all  these 
titles  might  be  justified  from  the  sacred  volume,  they 
were  all  correct.     With  regard  to  the  wilful  murderer 
of  a  Moslem,  you  would  be  correct  in  holding  that 
he  was  saved  or  that  he  was  damned  or  that  his  fate 
was  undecided.      His  meaning  was  thought  to   be 
that,  since  all  these  opinions  appeared  to  be  found  in 


222    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 


the  Koran,  he  had  been  ordered  to  believe  in  them  ' 
all  ;  and  it  was  not  for  him  to  claim  any  further 
knowledge/  There  were  persons  who  endeavoured  ' 
to  settle  the  controversy  on  the  creation  of  the  Koran  ■ 
in  the  same  satisfactory  way,  by  allowing  that  both 
views  might  be  held.  Naturally,  this  attitude  would  j 
not  suit  many  minds,  and  it  is  doubtful  whether  this 
personage  had  even  the  honour  of  founding  a  school.  , 
It  seems  doubtful  whether  the  most  freethinking  | 
among  the  philosophers  displayed  a  more  tolerant  i 
spirit  towards  unbelievers  than  did  the  orthodox ;  • 
there  are,  however,  some  signs  that  occasionally  their  ^: 
reasoning  too  led  them  to  propositions  which  would  ] 
involve  a  completer  tolerance  than  was  usually  ex-  ^ 
hibited.  As  we  have  seen,  the  orthodox  view  is 
that  the  unbeliever's  acts  do  not  count ;  the  one  , 
iniquity  of  which  he  can  be  found  guilty  is  that  of  ' 
having  neglected  to  study  the  evidences  of  Islam.  ^ 
Abu'l-Hudhail  found  an  ingenious  argument  whence  ^ 
it  appeared  that  the  unbeliever  did  perform  certain  ; 
acts  that  are  pleasing  to  God.  For  the  word  of  \ 
God  contains  commands  and  prohibitions,  and  to  • 
obey  a  prohibition  is  to  obey  a  command.  Now, 
the  Koran  declares  that  Islam  is  the  only  religion 
in  God's  eyes,  and  so  forbids  all  other  religions.  If, 
then,  the  unbeliever  followed  all  the  forbidden  cults, 
he  would  be  disobeying  without  obeying ;  but  since 
he  follows  one  cult,  and  eschews  the  rest,  by  the 
mere  fact  of  his  following  one  forbidden  cult  he 
obeys  the  command  with  regard   to   all   the   other 

1  Mukhtalif  al-Hadlth,  p.  57. 


THE   PHILOSOPHICAL  SUPPLEMENT  223 

forbidden  cults.  The  reply  to  this  ingenious  argu- 
ment is  got  from  the  observation  of  Aristotle  that 
a  thing  may  have  more  than  one  contrary ;  whence 
it  may  be  possible  to  violate  a  false  religion  without 
thereby  obeying  the  true  one. 

One  of  the  philosophers  took  the  view  that  all 
non-Moslems  would,  instead  of  being  punished  in  the 
next  world,  merely  turn  into  dust ;  his  theory  being 
that  knowledge  was  obligatory,  i.e.  it  could  not  be 
acquired  but  came  by  compulsion ;  those  therefore 
to  whom  knowledge  had  not  come  were  irresponsible, 
and  could  have  no  future  life.  Another  philosopher, 
himself,  it  is  said,  the  son  of  a  captive,  disapproved 
of  captivity,  i.e.  of  making  slaves ;  his  argument  is 
not  perfectly  clear,  but  he  evidently  assumes  that 
captives  will  be  non-Moslems  who  had  as  yet  no 
knowledge  of  God,  and  who  therefore  had  com- 
mitted no  offence  justifying  their  being  made 
captives.  This  voice  against  slavery  is  almost  the 
only  one  we  can  find  in  Islamic  literature ;  and  it 
wins  so  little  accord  in  the  orthodox  critic's  mind 
that  the  latter  proudly  argues  from  it  that  the  author 
of  this  doctrine,  being  himself  the  son  of  a  captive 
and  slave-girl,  thereby  demonstrates  his  own  illegiti- 
macy ;  for  according  to  his  own  doctrine  his  father 
had  no  right  to  possess  a  slave.  The  works  of  this 
thinker,  Thumamah  Ibn  al-Ashras,  would  possess 
some  interest  for  us :  he  had  the  reputation  of  being 
a  scoffer,  and  is  said  to  have  called  those  who  flocked 
to  the  mosque  cattle,  wondering  what  "  that  Arab," 
viz.   the  Prophet,  had  made  of  them.     A  tradition 


224    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

also  makes  him  obtain  the  execution  of  a  man  who 
charged  the  philosophers  of  his  own  school  with 
heresy. 

Of  the  numerous  founders  of  schools  who  arose  in 
the  second  and  third  centuries  of  Islam,  only  one,  it 
appears,  is  known  at  first  hand ;  voluminous  as  were 
the  works  of  the  others,  they  were  not  allowed  to 
survive.  The  two  main  tendencies  which  sectarians 
followed — belief  in  the  freedom  of  the  will,  and  belief 
in  justification  by  faith  without  works — were  so  un- 
popular with  orthodox  Moslems  that  books  in  which 
these  opinions  were  defended  had  little  chance  of 
surviving.  Traditions  were  invented,  which  are 
gravely  cited  by  orthodox  writers,  in  which  the 
Prophet  condemned  the  holders  of  both  these 
opinions  unsparingly ;  the  Believers  in  the  Freedom 
of  the  Will  were  called  by  him,  it  was  said,  "the 
Mazdians  of  this  nation  "  ;  for  by  making  man  a  free 
agent  they  established  in  nature  a  power  outside  God. 
He  further  asserted  that  the  Murjis  were  accursed  by 
the  mouth  of  seventy  prophets.  Their  name  was  then 
unknown ;  but  the  Prophet  explained  that  he  meant 
those  who  regarded  faith  as  verbal  expression  only. 
Yet  we  fancy  that  the  verbal  expression  was  that  to 
which  he  attached  most  importance — if  there  be  any 
truth  in  his  biography. 

Still,  numerous  works  have  been  preserved  by  one 
of  these  founders  of  sects — Jahiz  of  Basrah,  probably 
the  most  important  of  all  Moslem  authors,  whose 
treatises  are  mines  of  information  on  Arab  antiquities 
and  the  civilisation  of  the  Islam  of  the  first  centuries 


THE   PHILOSOPHICAL   SUPPLEMENT  225 

after  the  Migration.  A  certain  amount  of  contro- 
versial matter  is  to  be  found  in  the  most  lengthy 
of  his  as  yet  published  works — the  zoology.  It  is 
curious  that  the  same  writer  who  charges  Jahiz  with 
having  plagiarised  his  zoology  from  Aristotle  also 
declares  that  Aristotle  got  his  from  the  Arabs.  Neither 
charge  can  be  sustained :  the  amount  which  Jahiz 
owes  to  the  Greek  philosopher  is  very  slight ;  he 
only  cites  Aristotle  occasionally,  and  probably  not 
at  first  hand,  though  he  is  aware  that  the  Greek 
treatises  have  suffered  much  from  clerical  errors  and 
mistranslation.  In  general  he  appears  rather  anxious 
to  get  away  from  his  subject  than  to  adhere  to  it, 
and  the  reader  will  certainly  learn  more  from  the 
digressions  than  from  what  is  said  on  the  supposed 
theme. 

This  work  contains  some  reports  of  discussions 
between  Moslems  and  Jews,  Christians,  or  Mazdians, 
and  these  seem  to  have  been  conducted  with  good 
temper.  Considerable  curiosity  seems  in  most  ages 
to  have  been  displayed  by  Moslems  with  regard  to 
the  doctrines  of  those  sects  which  they  permitted  to 
exist,  and  it  is  likely  that  their  representatives  were 
more  often  the  defending  than  the  attacking  party ; 
even  where  the  Moslem  bestows  praise  on  members 
of  these  subject  cults,  he  makes  no  secret  of  his 
claim  of  superiority.  Still,  in  the  process  of  dis- 
covering their  doctrines  and  learning  how  they  were 
defended  the  Moslem  naturally  had  his  attention 
drawn   to   his  own  system   and   what   view   it  was 

supposed  to  hold  on  the  subject ;  and,  as  has  been 

15 


226    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

seen,  the  Koran  had  often  to  decide  a  question  on 
which  it  either  gave  no  answer  or  gave  more  than 
one. 

From  the  statements  in  the  zoology  it  would 
appear  that  various  questions  which  are  included  in 
ontology  and  metaphysics  had  been  greatly  exercising 
the  minds  of  the  JNIoslem  theologians,  and  the  recon- 
ciliation of  even  elementary  science  with  the  Koran 
had  not  been  found  easy.  If  the  stars  and  sun  were 
not  merely  lamps,  as  the  Koran  asserted,  but  bodies, 
as  the  Greek  astronomy  taught,  how  could  the 
former  be  flung  at  demons  ?  Jahiz  discusses  this 
difficult  matter,  and  replies  that  it  need  not  necessarily 
apply  to  all  the  stars,  but  only  to  some ;  and  since 
the  stars  are  innumerable,  it  is  absurd  to  suppose  that 
any  one  would  be  missed  from  the  sky  if  it  were 
flung  at  a  demon  ;  and  the  Koran  need  not  necessarily 
mean  that  the  whole  star  was  so  flung,  but  may  refer 
only  to  its  flame. 

The  existence  of  the  jinn  themselves  was  not  easy 
to  reconcile  with  Greek  science,  and  yet  the  Koran 
says  too  much  about  them  to  permit  of  their  being 
simply  rejected.  Jahiz  devotes  a  long  section  to 
proving  their  existence  chiefly  by  the  assertions 
of  well-known  persons  who  had  come  in  contact 
with  them.  The  stories  here  told  seem  excessively 
childish,  e.g.  accounts  of  unions  between  male  jinn 
and  women,  or  female  jinn  and  men  ;  a  grandson  of 
Iblis  himself  had  lived  and  been  known  in  Kufah. 
Whether  consciously  descending  to  the  level  of  his 
audience,  or  himself  entertaining  these  opinions,   it 


THE   PHILOSOPHICAL  SUPPLEMENT  227 

is  certain  that  this  founder  of  a  freethinking  sect 
lends  his  name  to  the  grossest  superstitions.  He  has 
a  chapter  on  the  evil  eye,  which  he  endeavours  to 
explain,  and  of  which  he  gives  some  notable  examples  ; 
and  he  is  also  a  believer  in  spells.  The  Caliph  Mansur, 
wishing  to  test  the  powers  of  a  snake-charmer,  had 
a  leaden  snake  made  and  inserted  in  his  roof:  he 
then  summoned  a  charmer  to  deal  with  it  For  a 
long  time  this  leaden  model  resisted  the  utmost 
efforts  of  the  charmer ;  finally  it  melted — literally — 
and  came  down  from  its  perch. 

The  fragments  of  metaphysical  discussions  which 
this  book  contains  seem,  then,  only  partially  serious, 
yet  they  are  probably  fair  specimens  of  what  went 
on  in  the  mosques  where  these  matters  were  discussed. 
The  Koran  has  of  course  to  be  quoted  at  every  stage  ; 
where  it  fails,  recourse  is  had  to  tradition. 

In  the  course  of  the  discussions  it  became  clear  that 
certain  behefs  could  only  be  held  by  the  dahriyyah 
"atheists,"  persons  who  denied  the  existence  of 
angels,  jinn,  prophets,  witchcraft,  and  spells.  Such 
an  opinion  was  that  of  the  eternity  of  matter ;  clearly 
matter,  like  everything  else,  was  not  eternal,  but  had 
been  created  by  God. 

Attention  has  been  called  to  this  zoology  because 
outside  it,  in  lieu  of  the  works  of  the  heretics,  we 
have  selections  from  their  doctrines  made  indeed 
by  an  author  of  the  early  fifth  century  of  Islam, 
who  appears  to  have  possessed  many  of  them  and 
to  have  studied  them  with  care,  but  is  himself 
violently  antagonistic  and   enumerates   the  dogmas 


228    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

of  these  persons  as  so  many  disgraces.  The  range 
of  subjects  these  lost  works  covered  seems  to  have 
been  as  wide  as  that  covered  by  the  encyclopaedias 
of  the  Greeks  of  old  ;  these  theologians  had  their 
own  physical  and  metaphysical  systems,  and  to  a 
certain  extent  their  logic,  their  ethics,  and  their 
systems  of  law.  They  are  quoted  for  innovations 
in  matters  which  come  strictly  within  the  domain 
of  the  jurist  no  less  than  for  such  as  belong  to 
theology.  Nazzam  is  charged  with  having  limited 
the  amount  which  constituted  a  theft  punishable 
with  loss  of  the  hand  to  200  dirhems,  whereas  the 
great  jurists  settled  that  the  punishment  was  to  be 
incurred  by  a  theft  of  2^  dirhems.  He  also  denied 
that  a  divorce  could  be  effected  by  any  form  of 
words  other  than  that  which  expressed  the  husband's 
intention  with  absolute  plainness.  They  also  made 
incursions  into  the  region  called  Principles  of  Juris- 
prudence. Abu'l-Hudhail  demanded  as  evidence 
for  a  tradition  no  fewer  than  twenty  witnesses,  one 
of  whom  must  be  known  to  have  been  qualified  for 
Paradise.  To  some  extent  the  criticism  of  Moslem 
history  came  within  their  scope  ;  they  passed  judgment 
on  those  early  Moslem  heroes  and  heroines  who  had 
taken  part  in  civil  wars. 

Whether  Islam  gained  or  lost  by  these  sectarian 
developments  may  be  a  subject  of  dispute ;  the 
charge  that  Islam  was  ruined  by  the  introduction 
of  Greek  science  and  philosophy  is  in  any  case 
untenable,  since,  as  has  been  seen,  the  questions 
were    posed    and   the   sects    formed    before    Greek 


THE   PHILOSOPHICAL   SUPPLEMENT  229 

thought  had  reached  the  Moslems  except  in  those 
results  which  had  become  common  property.  The 
formulation  of  Islamic  dogma  was  as  much  a  neces- 
sity due  to  the  settlement  of  the  Islamic  empire  as 
was  the  codification  of  the  law ;  just  as  magistrates 
had  to  know  what  was  the  law  in  a  variety  of 
cases,  so  those  who  were  constantly  and  perforce 
using  the  words  "  faith,"  "  the  soul,"  "  God,"  "  the 
next  world,"  had  to  know  what  they  ought  to  think 
about  them.  And  since  Islam  was  far  more  a 
political  than  a  religious  system,  the  opinions 
evolved  could  not  easily  be  separated  from  Islamic 
politics,  and  in  any  classification  of  the  sects  political 
and  metaphysical  questions  are  hopelessly  mixed. 
When  Greek  philosophy  was  actually  pressed  into 
the  service,  its  results  were  at  times  accepted 
blindly,  at  times  rejected  fanatically.  That  the 
Islamic  world  awoke  to  the  appreciation  of  these 
monuments  before  Western  Europe  seems  to  be 
attested,  and  some  familiar  phrases,  like  'premise  in 
logic,  retain  the  memory  of  this.  Yet  that  Islamic 
authors  added  nothing  to  Greek  philosophy  seems 
also  to  be  attested,  since  when  once  Western  Europe 
had  recovered  the  Greek  originals  it  discarded  for 
good  the  Arabic  intermediaries. 


LECTURE   VIII 

THE    HISTORICAL    SUPPLEMENT 

It  is  said  that  at  the  time  of  the  French  Revolution 
there  were  persons  who  wished  to  destroy  all  earlier 
literature  so  that  the  world  might  begin  afresh.  It 
would  seem  that  such  a  view  of  the  function  and 
nature  of  Islam  had  impressed  itself  on  the  Prophet's 
imagination  towards  the  end  of  his  life,  when  he 
supposed  that  a  new  cosmic  era  had  commenced. 
The  relative  positions  of  the  planets  had  come  back 
to  the  same  as  they  had  occupied  at  the  beginning  of 
creation.  Whereas,  then,  Islam  had  at  first  been 
conceived  of  as  based  on  earlier  missions,  which  it 
continued  and  applied  to  the  special  needs  of  Arabia 
rather  than  superseded,  when  the  idea  of  world- 
conquest  had  become  connected  with  it,  it  could 
afford  to  reject  that  basis.  The  maxim  "  Islam 
cancels  all  that  is  before  it,"  of  the  utmost  importance 
in  morals  and  law,  also  came  to  be  historically 
applied.  The  amount  of  past  history  which  the 
Koran  contained  was  all  that  was  worth  knowing. 
Converts  to  Islam  desired  to  forget  their  past :  when 
asked  questions  about  the  earlier  condition,  they 
reply  with  the  fixed  formula,  "  God  has  put  an  end  to 

230 


THE   HISTORICAL   SUPPLEMENT  231 

all  that,  so  why  recur  to  it  ? "  The  process  which  we 
have  seen  to  have  been  carried  out  in  jurisprudence 
found  its  analogue  in  history  :  practice  did  not  mean 
"  uninterrupted  practice,"  but  the  Prophet's  practice  ; 
the  era  at  which  human  memory  commenced  was 
the  life  of  the  Prophet,  and  only  such  practice  as 
was  sanctioned  then  had  value  or  was  to  be  main- 
tained. Similarly,  no  preceding  history  had  value  ; 
but  that  time,  when  men  were  living  who  saw 
and  heard  the  Prophet,  could  not  be  sufficiently 
studied. 

It  is  doubtless  owing  to  this  that  Arabic  authors 
have  so  little  that  is  of  value  to  record  about  Arabia. 
In  South  Arabia,  where  writing  was  so  familiar  and 
so  long  practised,  it  is  difficult  to  believe  that  there 
were  no  written  chronicles ;  and  even  in  Central 
Arabia  something  was  probably  known  about  the 
origin  and  age  of  the  most  important  cities.  Yet  it 
is  the  fact  that  with  the  Moslems  real  and  continuous 
history  commences  with  the  Prophet's  Migration ; 
what  precedes  that  date  is  a  mass  of  fiction,  wherein 
some  facts  may  lie  buried  or  occasionally  appear. 
It  can  indeed  be  used  in  illustration  of  matter  which 
happens  to  be  known  from  some  trustworthy  source ; 
but  for  other  purposes  it  is  worthless.  Even  of  the 
pre- Islamic  worships  the  Arabian  archeeologists  have 
practically  nothing  to  add  to  the  meagre  statements 
of  the  Koran  ;  and  the  rule  that  no  case  may  be 
judged  simply  by  the  statements  of  one  litigant 
ought  not  to  be  discarded  in  this  matter.  We 
should   like   to   know  what   the   pagan   priests   and 


232    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

worshippers  said  or  thought  about  their  gods  and 
goddesses  as  well  as  what  the  Koran  says. 

Those  who  ventured  outside  the  Koran  and  con- 
sulted the  books  which  the  Koran  ostensibly  confirms 
found  themselves  confronted  with  a  difficulty.  It 
was  quite  true  that  Pharaoh,  Korah,  and  Haman  were 
mentioned  in  the  Old  Testament ;  but  whereas  in 
the  Koran  Haman  is  the  vizier  of  the  Egyptian 
king,  in  the  Old  Testament  he  is  the  minister  of  a 
Persian  king  who  lived  about  a  thousand  years  later ; 
and  whereas  in  the  Koran,  Korah — if  he  be  meant  by 
Karun — figures  as  a  man  of  vast  wealth  who  was 
punished  for  trusting  to  it,  in  the  Old  Testament 
there  is  nothing  about  this,  and  his  punishment  is 
for  a  very  different  offence.  Now,  in  the  Old  Testa- 
ment and  its  continuation  in  the  New,  the  narratives 
hang  together  in  chronological  sequence,  and  the 
transference  of  Haman  from  the  time  after  the  Exile 
to  that  of  Moses  is  unthinkable.  Those,  therefore, 
who  consulted  the  books  of  the  Jews  and  Christians 
found  themselves  plunged  not  into  light  but  into 
darkness — on  the  assumption  that  the  Koran  was 
the  infallible  word  of  God  and  that  it  confirmed 
previous  revelations. 

According  to  the  tradition,  Mohammed  actually 
forbade  his  followers  to  read  the  books  which  the 
Koran  ostensibly  confirmed,  alleging  that  the  copies 
of  the  Jews  and  Christians  had  been  intentionally 
corrupted :  a  charge  which  in  the  Koran  itself  is 
confined  to  the  actual  recitation ;  but  he  is  also 
supposed  in  the  case  of  serious  discrepancies  between 


THE    HISTORICAL   SUPPLEMENT  233 

his  statements  and  those  of  the  older  sacred  books 
to  have  harmonised  them  by  some  gentler  method. 
Eventually  there  came  to  pass  what  might  have  been 
expected  to  happen ;  when  the  authority  of  the 
Koran  was  so  secured  that  there  was  no  danger  of 
its  being  shaken,  illustration  and  supplementing  from 
the  Jewish  and  Christian  books  were  occasionally 
practised,  though  scarcely  commended ;  ^  and  indeed 
it  is  probable  that  certain  converts  from  the  older 
systems  gladly  used  and  even  paraded  their  know- 
ledge, which,  so  far  as  it  served  to  illustrate  the 
Koran,  would  be  sure  of  appreciation.  The  citation 
of  these  works  in  confirmation  of  the  Koran  was  thus 
permissible,  but  naturally  they  were  not  to  be  heard 
when  they  contradicted  it. 

To  the  rest  of  pagan  history  the  Moslem  attitude 
was  not  dissimilar  to  the  modern  European  attitude 
with  regard  to  far-ofF  history :  the  man  of  ordinary 
education  is  not  required  to  be  familiar  with  the 
ancient  Egyptian  dynasties,  or  with  the  sequence 
of  the  Babylonian  kings.  What  he  usually  knows 
about  them  is  what  is  told  either  in  the  Bible  or  in 
Herodotus,  not  what  has  been  made  out  from  the 
inscriptions  by  specialists. 

One  method  of  dealing  with  the  discrepancies 
between  the  Biblical  narratives  and  the  Koran  was 
to  supply  the  original  Bible  which  the  Jews  and 
Christians  had  been  supposed  to  corrupt.  Copies  of 
such  works  are  occasionally  found  ;  they  are  close 
imitations  in  style  of  the  Koran,  and  therefore  take 

1  Ibn  Khallikan  ii.  148. 


234    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM  J 

i 

the  form  of  addresses  by  the  Divine  Being  to  the  I 

prophets  to  whom  they  are  supposed  to  have  been  \ 

revealed.       Apparently    Sprenger    was    misled   into  . 

supposing  that  a  book  of  this  kind,  bearing  the  name  j 

of  Abraham,  was   the   Roll   of  Abraham  to   which  | 

some  early  Surahs  of  the  Koran  refer.     The  Sufi  Abu  j 

Tahb   al-Mekki   makes  tolerably  frequent  use  of  a  i 

collection    which  he  calls  "  the  Israelite  traditions,"  ; 

some   of  which   are   evidently   based   on    narratives  I 

actually  found  in  the  Bible.     Thus  he  tells  the  story 

of  the  Temple  of  Jeroboam   and  the  adventure  of  \ 

the  prophet   who   announced    its  fall  with  very  fair  i 

accuracy ;  proper  names  are  indeed  omitted,  and  the  , 

whole  story  is  a  sort  of  replica  of  the   Mosque  of  ; 

Dii'dr  or  "  nonconformity,"  which  was  built  by  some  ,  \ 

of  the   disaffected   near   the   end    of   the   Prophet's  j 

career,  and  of  which  the  Prophet  ordered  the  destruc-  ' 

tion  ;    only  the  prophet  who  disobeyed  the  order  is  i 

shown  by  a  special   revelation   to  have   been   eaten  : 

by  the  lion  not  as  a  punishment,  but  as  an  honour,  i 

One  Khaithamah  declared  that  the  Gospel  contained  \ 

a  statement  about  the  keys  of  Korah's  treasure-houses, 

which  according  to  the  Koran  were  a  load  for  several  • 

persons ;   the  Gospel  gave  the   exact  weight.^     The  ; 

"  Gospel "  perhaps  was  also   responsible  for  a  long  ' 

story  about  the  relations  between  Korah  and  Moses,  ^ 

in  which  the  latter  is  credited  with  introducing  a 

code  identical  with  that  of  Mohammed.     In  these  j 

cases  we  have  to  do  with  pure  fiction ;    but,  as  we  i 

have  seen,  at  times  the  information  really  goes  back  \ 

1  Tabarl,  Comm.  xx.  63-68.  j 

i 
\ 


THE   HISTORICAL   SUPPLEMENT  235 

to  the  Jewish  or  Christian  Scriptures,  only  it  is 
altered  in  the  interest  of  Islam.  Abu  Nu'aim  gives 
a  sort  of  epitome  of  the  prophecies  of  Isaiah,  wherein 
the  Servant  of  the  Lord  is  interpreted  as  the  Prophet ; 
some  verses  are  quoted  almost  literally,  but  they  are 
interpolated  with  other  matter  so  as  to  bring  in  the 
chief  facts  of  the  Prophet's  life.  He  also  gives  a 
fairly  accurate  account  of  the  Vision  of  Nebuchad- 
nezzar, only  he  naturally  makes  the  stone  cut  out  of 
the  living  rock  to  stand  for  the  Mohammedan  re- 
ligion. The  "  Israelite  traditions  "  were  not  merely 
repeated  orally ;  Abii  Talib  tells  us  that  he  had 
read  in  a  Surah  of  the  Torah  called  "  the  Surah 
of  Yearning,"  how  the  Divine  Being  taunted  some- 
one with  the  interest  which  he  took  in  a  letter  from 
a  friend  as  compared  with  his  neglect  of  the  divine 
revelation  and  the  messages  which  it  contained. 
Yet  we  learn  how  little  the  actual  books  were 
consulted  from  the  fact  that  such  a  scholar  as  Jahiz 
records  stories  which  one  of  the  early  proselytes  told 
out  of  the  Torah  on  the  authority  of  that  proselyte, 
and  merely  guesses  that  by  the  Torah  he  means  one 
of  the  other  books  to  be  found  in  the  Jewish  Bible/ 

The  theory  that  we  should  not  differentiate 
between  the  prophets,  which  is  a  maxim  of  the 
Koran,  and  which  perhaps  accounts  for  a  certain 
carelessness  that  we  find  in  the  New  Testament  as 
to  the  ascription  of  prophecies,  leads  to  the  attribu- 
tion of  sayings  to  personages  who,  we  may  be  sure, 
never  uttered  them ;  thus  there  is  a  saying  attributed 

1   Hayawan  iv.  QQ. 


236    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

to  Christ  to  the  effect  that  by  saying  the  prescribed 
prayers  a  man  escapes  God's  vengeance,  and  by 
prayers  of  supererogation  wins  his  way  to  God's 
favour ;  but  we  are  told  that  there  was  a  similar 
saying  ascribed  to  the  Prophet  Mohammed,  to  whom 
it  is  somewhat  more  appropriate.  Where  the  older 
books  are  actually  quoted,  there  is  usually  a  tendency 
to  expand  or  repeat,  or  at  any  rate  introduce  un- 
necessary verbiage,  even  where  the  sense  is  not 
seriously  altered.  A  lengthy  example  is  quoted  in 
Mohamviedanism  ;  ^  another  which  may  be  given  from 
the  work  of  Abu  Talib  al-Mekki  is  that  Christ  said, 
"  Sit  not  with  the  dead,  lest  your  hearts  die."  He 
was  asked,  "Who  are  the  dead?"  He  replied,  "Those 
who  love  the  world  and  desire  it."  That  this  is  a 
reminiscence  of  a  passage  in  the  Gospel  may  be 
allowed  ;  but  it  preserves  more  of  the  commentary 
than  of  the  text.  Similar  paraphrases  are  to  be 
found  of  passages  of  Isaiah,  such  as  "  This  people 
approacheth  me  with  the  lips,  but  their  heart  is  far 
from  me "  ;  though  in  this  case  the  application  is 
correct,  or  at  least  appears  to  be  so.  Occasionally 
the  source  of  the  references  is  some  Jewish  Midrash, 
either  existing  or  lost.  So  we  are  told  that  Asaph 
committed  some  oifence  so  terrible  that  it  had  best 
not  be  mentioned,  but  was  pardoned  ;  whereas  the 
offence  of  Balaam  was  comparatively  mild,  but  it 
was  not  pardoned. 

These  apocrypha,  however,  seem  to  have  contained 
mainly  homiletic  matter,  and  possibly  an  occasional 

1  P.  207. 


THE   HISTORICAL  SUPPLEMENT  237 

prophecy  relating  to  the  coming  of  the  Prophet ; 
indeed  the  Koran  declares  that  the  name  Ahmad  is 
to  be  found  in  the  Gospel,  and  an  ancient  charge 
against  the  Jews  is  that  of  having  altered  a  descrip- 
tion of  the  Prophet  which  was  to  be  found  in  the 
Law.  In  consequence  of  these  Biblical  or  pseudo- 
Biblical  studies  the  Moslems  became  famihar  with  a 
few  Old  Testament  names  which  are  not  found  in 
the  Koran ;  those  of  the  New  Testament  at  all 
times  remained  strange  to  them. 

But  if  the  records  of  the  Jews  and  Christians  had 

to  be  rewritten  for  edifying  purposes,  those  of  early 

Islam  required  something   of  the  same  sort.     It  is 

curious  how  little  of  the  miraculous  or  the  homiletic 

is  found  in  the  earliest  life  of  the  Prophet :  its  author 

Ibn   Ishak   composed   it    in  a  form  which  required 

some  expurgation  at  the  hands  of  its  earliest  editors ; 

the  editor  whose  recension   has    come   down   to  us 

confesses  that  he  omitted  matter  calculated  to  give 

offence.    Even  so  Ibn  Ishak  places  all  the  generosity, 

the  heroism,  and  the  public  and  private  virtues  on 

the   side   of  Mohammed's  enemies.     The   character 

which  he  gives  the  Companions   of  the  Prophet   is 

rarely  pleasing,  even  if  it   is  not  actually  repulsive. 

All  these  persons  had  somehow  to  be  compelled  to 

live   up   to   their    characters,    and    to   be   furnished 

besides   with   supplies   of   wise   and   noble    sayings. 

The  period  of  the  pious  Caliphs  came  to  be  depicted 

as   a   sort   of  halcyon  days  of  the  world,  when  the 

rulers  set  an  example  of  piety  and  justice  such  as  the 

world  has  never  seen  at  any  other  time. 


238    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM    : 

( 

With  regard  to  the  Hfe  of  the  Prophet,  the  fictions    I 

wherewith  it  was  embelHshed  were  rarely  such  as  to    ' 

impair  the  historical  narrative.     The  order  of  events    ; 

almost  from  the  commencement  of  the  mission  was    ' 

of  such   grave   importance  for  a  variety  of  reasons 

that   serious   alteration  was  not  easily  possible ;  the    i 

chronology  of  that  career  had  come  to  be  bound  up   | 

wdth  a  variety  of  vested  interests,  whence  it  was  not   | 

possible  to  disturb  it.     The  hands  and  arms  whereon   i 

the   Prophet   had  relied   were   so   well   known,   the   | 

exploits  of  the    champions  of  Islam   so   celebrated,   I 

that  they  had  to  be  admitted.     In  a  letter  which  is   I 

some  ten  years  earlier  in  date  than  the  first  biography  j 

of  the  Prophet,  the  Caliph  Mansiir  assumes  that  the   \ 

main  facts  of  it  are  known :  the  genuineness  of  the  ' 

letter  is  evinced  by  the  fact  that  its  author  carelessly  | 

misquotes  the  Koran.     The  attempts  that  are  made  \ 

to  whitewash  the  heros  eponymus  of  the  Abbasids,  | 

the  Prophet's  uncle  'Abbas,  by  making  him   out  a 

secret   adherent  of  the    Prophet,  are   either  clumsy 

or  unconvincing.     History  was  not  seriously  affected  i 

by   mild   fictions,    showing    how   the    Prophet    had  \ 

decided  various  cases  that  had  come  up  for  decision,  \ 

or  attributing  to  him  stores  of  wisdom  on  all  subjects,  I 

not   excepting   medicine   and    cookery.     The   canon  j 

which  we  have  seen  to  be  assumed   or   formulated,  I 

that  the  Prophet's  practices    should  be  preferred  to  | 

the  product  of  the  reasoning  faculty,  was  a  safeguard  i 

against   serious  misrepresentation  of  his  career  ;  for  \ 

since  a  thing  was  right  because  he  had  said  or  done  j 

it,  his  character  would  not  suffer  from  anything  that  ■ 

i 
1 


THE   HISTORICAL   SUPPLEMENT  239 

might  be  recorded  about  him.  Still,  it  could  not  be 
expected  that  his  followers  would  wish  otherwise 
than  that  his  character  should  be  regarded  as 
admirable  by  any  standard ;  and  in  treatises  of 
metaphysical  theology  the  unapproachable  perfection 
of  the  Prophet's  character  is  urged  as  a  proof  of  his 
mission. 

On  the  other   hand,   there   is    a   principle   deeply 
grounded  in  human  nature  that  such  claims  as  were 
made  by  the  Prophet,  and  maintained  by  him  and 
his  adherents  on  his  behalf  at  the  sword's  point,  should 
be   backed   by  something   more  overwhelming  than 
perfections  of  character,  of  style,  or  even  of  scholar- 
ship.    The  miracle  of  the  Koran,  which  consists  in 
the   unattainable   perfections  of  the  latter,  was  not 
sufficient    for    ages   in    which    a    high    standard   of 
correctness   and  even   of  eloquence   was   demanded 
of  all  writers,  and  wherein  the  historical  matters  to 
which   the    Koran   makes    allusion   were   matters  of 
common   knowledge.     It   was   probably  difficult   to 
realise  the  degree  of  ignorance  wherewith  the  Prophet 
credits  himself  and  his  Meccan  contemporaries ;  and 
the    Koran  itself  credited  certain  prophets,  notably 
Moses  and  Jesus,  with  performances  to  which  the  plain 
biography  of  Mohammed  offered  no  parallel.     When 
Moslems  consented  to  argue  with  Jews  or  Christians, 
grave  embarrassment  must  have  been  occasioned  by 
this  proof  of  superiority  which  the  opponents  could 
adduce  from  the  irrefragable  testimony  of  the  Moslem 
Scriptures.     Hence  a  not  unnatural  endeavour  was 
made  to  meet  these  opponents  on  their  own  ground  : 


240    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

to  accept  the  natural  opinion  that  a  supernatural 
mission  must  be  attested  by  supernatural  powers  ; 
but  to  show  that  the  exploits  of  the  Islamic  Prophet 
in  this  field  fell  short  in  no  way  of  those  which 
had  formed  the  glory  of  the  founders  of  Judaism 
and  Christianity. 

The  miracle  whereby  history  was  least  falsified  was 
prophecy :  Mohammed  could  be  credited  harmlessly 
wdth  having  foretold  the  most  noteworthy  events 
of  the  period  which  followed  his  death.  Thus  he 
foretold  how  and  when  Ali  should  die;  he  warned 
Zubair  that  he  would  fight  against  Ali,  but  that  he 
would  be  in  the  wrong ;  he  warned  his  wife  'A'ishah 
that  at  one  of  his  wives  the  dogs  of  Hau  ab  would  bark, 
and  that  this  would  be  the  worse  for  her  ;  and  ' A'ishah 
recalled  this  saying  on  her  way  to  stir  up  the  people 
of  Basrah  against  Ali — the  commencement  of  that 
civil  war  which  never  really  stopped.  When  another 
eminent  follower  of  the  Prophet,  'Ammar  Ibn  Yasir, 
was  slain  on  the  field  of  SifFin,  it  was  remembered 
how  the  Prophet  had  foretold  that  he  would  be 
killed  by  usurpers,  and  indeed  uttered  this  prophecy 
at  the  time  when  the  Mosque  of  Medinah  was  being 
built.  We  have  already  seen  him  credited  with 
prophecies  about  the  chief  sects  of  Islam,  whose 
names  had  not  been  invented  in  his  lifetime.  These 
inventions  naturally  led  to  some  difficulties,  which 
it  required  some  further  exercise  of  the  imagination 
to  solve.  If  *A'ishah  had  really  been  warned  about 
the  dogs  of  Hau'ab,  how  came  she  to  continue  her 
expedition  ?     If  Ali  knew  who  was  to  be  his  assassin, 


THE   HISTORICAL  SUPPLEMENT  24l 

why  did  he  not  anticipate  the  blow  ?  If  Zubair  had 
been  told  beforehand  that  he  would  be  in  the  wrong 
in  his  dispute  with  AH,  why  did  he  persist  therein  ? 
Even  in  the  case  of  Fatimah,  who  was  told  by  the 
dying  Prophet  that  she  was  to  follow  him  speedily, 
it  was  clear  that  the  prophecy  had  no  influence  either 
on  her  conduct  or  that  of  anyone  else. 

A  considerable  collection  of  matter,  with  the  usual 
chains  of  authorities,  attesting  the  miraculous  ele- 
ments in  the  Prophet's  career,  was  put  together  in 
the  fourth  century  of  Islam  by  one  Abu  Nu'aim, 
under  the  title  "  Proofs  of  the  Prophetic  Mission." 
Any  reader  of  hagiologies  is  aware  that  the  human 
fancy  is  ordinarily  somewhat  sterile,  and  the  cir- 
cumstances of  a  miraculous  career  admit  of  only 
shght  variations.  The  fancy  is  by  no  means  satis- 
fied with  such  a  career  commencing  late  in  life ; 
Mohammed  must  have  been  a  prophet  from  his 
birth — nay  before  his  birth — nay  from  the  beginning 
of  the  world.  The  second  chapter  of  the  Dalail 
gives  evidence  showing  that  the  Prophet's  call  took 
place  when  Adam  was  half  created,  when  his  clay 
had  been  modelled  but  the  spirit  had  not  yet  been 
infused.  The  statement,  indeed,  goes  back  to  the 
Prophet  himself;  but  some  external  attestation  is 
also  adduced.  When  the  Prophet  first  announced 
his  mission  in  Meccah,  a  certain  Jubair  Ibn  Mut'im 
went  on  a  trading  expedition  to  Bosra ;  there 
some  Christians  assured  him  that  in  a  collection  of 
statues   they  had   one  of  the    Prophet  who  was  to 

come   forth,  and   requested   him  to  see  whether  he 

16 


242    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

could  identify  the  statue  of  Mohammed.  He  could 
not  find  it  in  the  first  monastery  into  which  he 
/  was  taken,  but  found  it  easily  in  the  second.  This 
collection  of  prophetic  statues  fortunately  served 
to  settle  another  controversy,  viz.  that  between  the 
two  great  sects  of  Islam  ;  for  this  monastery  con- 
tained not  only  the  image  of  the  Prophet,  but  also 
that  of  his  legitimate  successor,  who  turned  out  to 
be  Abu  Bakr. 

Another  anecdote  of  the  same  sort  follows,  but 
it  is  less  convincing,  since  it  is  located  after  the 
Prophet's  death,  when  a  mission  was  sent  by  Abu 
Bakr  to  the  Byzantine  sovereign  who  happened 
to  be  in  Damascus.  He  exhibits  to  his  visitors 
a  whole  collection  of  portraits  on  silk,  among  which 
they  recognise  that  of  their  Prophet ;  the  rest,  as 
the  king  explains,  are  representations  of  his  pre- 
decessors, beginning  with  Adam.  To  the  question 
whence  the  king  had  got  this  valuable  collection  of 
portraits  he  replied  that  Adam  had  requested  to  be 
shown  the  figures  of  all  his  prophetic  posterity,  and 
this  request  had  been  granted  by  Allah ;  they 
remained  in  the  Treasury  of  Adam  in  the  A¥est 
till  it  was  plundered  by  Alexander  the  Great.  At 
some  time  Daniel  obtained  access  to  them  and  copied 
them,  and  apparently  Daniel's  copies  were  those 
shown  in  Damascus.  What  the  collection  proved 
was  that  the  Prophet's  call  was  at  the  least  coeval 
with  the  creation  of  Adam. 

Neither  of  these  stories  is  free  from  religious 
objections  ;  for  since  statues  are  tabooed,  and  pictures 


THE   HISTORICAL  SUPPLEMENT  US 

disapproved  by  the  pious,  neither  of  these  impro- 
prieties ought  to  be  associated  with  the  Prophet. 
On  the  other  hand,  Christianity  dealt  so  much  in 
ico7is  of  reHgious  personages  that  Mohammed  might 
reasonably  be  expected  to  be  found  somewhere  in 
the  company  of  those  with  whom  the  Koran  regularly 
associates  him.  The  story  of  the  pictures  on  silk 
seems  also  to  bear  some  relation  to  the  Veronica 
napkin. 

If  we  consider  how  orthodox  Islam  denies  the 
credibility  of  Jews  or  Christians,  we  may  feel  some 
surprise  at  the  anxiety  with  which  attestations  of 
these  sectarians  to  the  genuineness  of  the  Prophet's 
mission  are  got  together.  Immediately  before  the 
Prophet's  arrival  at  Medinah  a  Jew  there  named 
Joshua  foretold  that  such  a  personage  would  come 
thither  from  Meccah  during  the  lifetime  of  some  then 
present ;  unfortunately  this  harbinger  of  the  Prophet 
himself  refused  to  believe  in  the  mission  which  he 
had  foretold — a  circumstance  which  seems  to  have 
occurred  at  other  times.  When  the  Prophet's  court- 
poet  Hassan  Ibn  Thabit  was  seven  or  eight  years 
of  age,  a  Jew  of  the  Koraizah  tribe  standing  on  the 
top  of  his  fortress  announced  to  the  other  Jews  the 
rising  of  the  Prophet  Ahmad 's  star ;  which  also 
portended  destruction  to  their  countrymen  in  Arabia. 
It  is  rather  interesting  that  by  this  time  the  Jews 
should  be  sufficiently  associated  with  astrology  to 
be  able  of  themselves  to  discharge  the  task  for  which 
the  Magi  are  called  in  in  the  Christian  Gospel. 
Indeed   the    coming  of  Ahmad  and  his  figure  were 


244    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

SO  well  known  to  the  Medinese  Jews  before  the 
Prophet's  call  that  the  children  used  to  be  taught 
all  about  him  in  the  schools.  Some  dissentient  Arabs 
after  the  Prophet  had  become  powerful  went  to  seek 
the  aid  of  the  Egyptian  governor,  whom  the  Arabs 
call  Mukaukis — a  puzzling  expression,  which  has  not 
yet  been  interpreted  with  certainty  ;  to  their  astonish- 
ment, the  Mukaukis  argued  forcibly  in  favour  of 
the  Prophet's  veracity,  and  the  inquiries  addressed 
to  bishops  of  the  Alexandrian  communities  with 
reference  to  the  description  of  Mohammed  to  be 
found  in  the  Christian  books  were  so  satisfactorily 
answered  that  these  Arabs  were  converted.  Some  of 
the  invaders  of  Irak  came  across  a  cave  in  which 
there  lived  one  Darib,  son  of  Bartholomew,  who  had 
remained  alive  since  the  time  of  Jesus  ;  he  sent  warm 
greetings  to  Omar  with  a  confession  of  faith  in 
Mohammed. 

We  find  that  among  the  confessors  to  whose  testi- 
mony some  weight  is  attached  in  the  Gospels  are 
demons,  even  when  they  are  driven  out.  The 
Prophet's  relations  with  these  beings  were  on  the 
whole  friendly,  and  we  learn  from  the  Koran  that  a 
number  of  them  adopted  Islam  ;  but  it  was  desirable 
to  get  some  of  their  testimony  recorded  by  others 
than  the  Prophet  himself.  The  first  harbinger  of  the 
mission  at  Medinah  was  a  pagan  woman  visited  by  a 
spirit  which  took  the  form  of  a  white  bird  perched 
on  a  wall ;  when  the  woman  asked  it  to  converse,  it 
replied  that  a  prophet  had  now  arisen  in  Meccah 
who  had  told  the  jinn  to  quit.     A  sorceress  consulted 


THE   HISTORICAL   SUPPLEMENT  245 

by  Othman  in  Syria   was  told   by  her  familiar  that 
he   could    now   no   longer   enter   her   door,  because 
Ahmad   had   appeared   and   the  jinn   had   to  make 
themselves  scarce.     Other  sorcerers  in  Arabia  were 
warned  by  their  familiars  that  their  trade  was  now 
abolished,  since  they  had  now  no  chance  of  eaves- 
dropping at  the  heavenly  council-chamber.     An  idol 
in  Samaya,  a  village  of  Oman,  found  voice  one  day 
at   a   sacrifice   and   bade   the   sacrificers    follow   the 
religion  of  Ahmad  who  had  just  appeared.     It  seems 
rather  hard  on  this  idol  that  the  sacrificer  in  answer 
to  this  message  destroyed  it.     On  the  other  hand,  the 
priest  obtained  through  the  Prophet's  intercession  a 
variety   of  blessings,  including   four   wives.     Voices 
were  heard  from  the  interior  of  other  fetishes  calling 
on  their  worshippers  to  abandon  idolatry  and  follow 
the  true  faith.     It  is  conceivable  that  some  of  these 
tales  may  go  back  to  the  time  of  the  Prophet,  when 
the  Arab  chieftains  were  hurrying  to  pay  homage  to 
the   new  ruler  and  excogitating  ingenious  flatteries. 
The  most  popular  of  all  is  the  romance  of  the  wizard 
Satih,  a  creature  without  bones  or  sinews,  who  could 
be  folded  up  like  a  garment ;  and  who,  imitating  the 
exploit  of  Daniel,  repeated  to  a  Ghassanide  king  a 
dream  which  he  had  seen,  foretelling  the  fortunes  of 
Arabia  and  the  arrival  of  the  Prophet. 

That  the  Prophet's  nativity  should  be  graced  with 
miracles  was  to  be  expected,  though  we  have  here 
a  difficulty  which  is  found  in  other  cases :  such 
miraculous  antecedents  ought,  one  fancies,  to  have 
prepared  the  people  of  Meccah  for  the  mission  when 


246    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

it  came,  whereas  historically  they  appear  to  have 
been  wholly  unprepared  for  it.  The  women  who 
attended  Aminah,  the  Prophet's  mother,  at  her 
confinement  saw  the  stars  fall  and  heard  mysterious 
voices ;  the  mother  of  one  of  the  foremost  Com- 
panions, named  Shifa,  was  one  of  these,  and  she 
treasured  up  these  experiences  until  the  call  came. 
That  the  powers  of  evil  should  make  some  attempt 
to  kill  him  in  his  youth  was  also  to  be  expected  ; 
when  he  was  being  reared  as  an  infant  among  the 
Banu  Sa'd  a  sorcerer  endeavoured  to  bring  about  his 
death,  but  his  nurse  succeeded  in  rescuing  him.  It 
is  rather  strange  that  no  such  attempt  seems  to  be 
recorded  on  the  part  of  the  Persian  king,  who  was 
warned  of  the  Prophet's  birth  by  a  whole  series  of 
portents,  including  the  fall  of  a  portion  of  his  palace 
and  the  extinction  of  the  sacred  fire  "  which  had  not 
been  extinguished  for  a  thousand  years  "  ;  he  so  far 
plays  the  part  of  Herod  that  he  solicits  the  aid  of 
magicians  in  interpreting  these  prodigies  ;  but  though 
he  learns  that  they  portend  trouble  to  come  from  the 
direction  of  Arabia,  he  does  not  appear  to  have  taken 
any  step  to  anticipate  it.  Like  Hezekiah  he  seems 
to  have  been  satisfied  with  a  promise  that  the  trouble 
should  not  come  in  his  time. 

Edifying  fiction  of  this  sort  has  to  hover  between 
two  contradictory  assumptions — one  that  the  infant 
is  highly  esteemed,  the  other  that  he  belonged  to  the 
humblest  class ;  thus  we  are  told  that  Mohammed's 
clan  was  so  wealthy,  and  his  arrival  so  welcome, 
that  the  whole  population  of  Meccah  was  entertained 


THE   HISTORICAL   SUPPLEMENT  247 

lavishly  by  his  grandfather  on  the  occasion  of  his 
birth  ;  on  the  other  hand,  that  none  of  the  wet-nurses 
who  came  to  Meccah  to  find  employment  would 
look  at  Mohammed,  because  they  could  not  expect 
to  gain  by  nursing  a  fatherless  boy.  Hence  he  had 
to  be  taken  by  a  woman  who  had  failed  to 
secure  any  foster-child,  and  the  woman  prospered 
marvellously  in  consequence. 

It  was  to  be  expected  that  the  migration  to 
Medinah  should  somehow  be  anticipated,  and  so 
Mohammed  is  made  to  go  to  Medinah  in  his  sixth 
year,  being  taken  thither  by  his  mother  on  a  visit 
to  her  relations.  Some  of  the  Jews  visit  the  house 
where  he  lodges  with  his  mother,  and  are  allowed  to 
investigate  his  person,  where  they  search  for  the  signs 
of  prophecy.  These,  of  course,  they  find,  and  inform 
his  relations  that  they  have  with  them  the  Prophet 
of  the  Arabs,  who  will  one  day  migrate  to  their  city, 
where  he  will  massacre  the  Jews.  A  slave-girl  who 
goes  with  them  "treasures  these  things  in  her  heart." 

The  imagination  is  not  much  exercised  over  the 
years  which  he  is  said  to  have  spent  under  the 
guardianship  of  his  grandfather  and  his  uncle  ;  the 
persons  who  are  made  to  foretell  his  greatness  are,  as 
before,  Jews  and  Christians,  because  it  is  clear  that 
the  Arabs  have  no  expectation  of  a  Prophet  or 
Messiah.  One  member  of  a  tribe  which  practised 
tracking  does  indeed  notice  the  extraordinary  re- 
semblance of  the  Prophet's  foot  to  that  of  Abraham, 
whose  sole  had  left  its  imprint  on  a  stone  in  the 
Meccan  sanctuary.     At  the  meals,  necessarily  scanty. 


248    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

provided  by  Abu  Talib  for  his  household,  it  was 
observed  that  if  the  Prophet  were  present  there  was 
always  enough  and  to  spare  ;  if  he  were  absent,  no 
one  had  enough. 

In  spite  of  his  appointment  to  the  prophetic  office 
having  been  made  when  Adam  was  only  half  created, 
some  further  consecration  was  required  ;  and  this 
was  by  a  baptism  of  the  heart,  two  angels  splitting 
his  stomach  and  washing  the  contents  with  snow 
before  replacing  them.  The  angels  appeared  in  the 
form  of  white  birds  to  a  playmate  of  the  Prophet, 
but  he  does  not  seem  to  have  witnessed  the  rest  of 
the  scene.  We  have  already  seen  that  "  purity  of 
heart  "  is  interpreted  literally  by  the  Moslem  mystics, 
as  a  state  to  be  produced  by  fasting,  whence  there  is 
nothing  incongruous  about  this  material  purgation. 
The  story  looks  like  a  conscious  improvement  on 
that  of  the  Saviour's  baptism,  especially  in  the 
introduction  of  the  angels  in  the  form  of  birds  ;  it 
was  argued  that  an  internal  cleansing  rather  than 
an  external  was  requisite.  Further,  Arabia,  and 
especially  Meccah,  has  no  river  which  could  serve  as 
the  analogue  of  the  Jordan.  The  word  "  clean  "  is 
that  which  Arabic  theologians  employ  for  "  holy  "  ; 
and  in  the  Koran  the  Prophet  is  bidden  clean  his 
garments,  where  garments,  it  is  supposed,  may  stand 
for  "  heart."  That  the  heart  of  man  is  the  source  of 
defilement  is  taught  in  the  Gospel,  in  a  striking 
passage  which  was  doubtless  familiar  to  many  who 
were  but  slightly  acquainted  with  the  Gospel.  The 
pious  inventor  of  this  story,  then,  wished  to  devise 


THE   HISTORICAL   SUPPLEMENT  249 

a  scheme  whereby  in  the  Prophet's  case  this  source 
of  pollution  should  have  been  rendered  clean,  and 
though  his  method  is  somewhat  naive,  it  was  effec- 
tive. The  phrase  "  washing  with  snow  "  is  probably 
due  to  a  slight  confusion  of  thought,  its  author  mean- 
ing washing  snow-white. 

In  the  narrative  of  the  Prophet's  journey  with  the 
caravan  to  Syria  we  leave  the  area  of  the  New 
Testament  and  get  traits  from  the  historical  books  of 
the  Old  Testament.  The  monk  Bahira  of  Bosra 
notices  that  as  the  caravan  proceeds  a  cloud  rests  on 
the  head  of  Mohammed,  and  when  they  alight  under 
a  tree,  the  cloud  overshadows  the  tree,  which  becomes 
covered  with  green  leaves.  Though  he  has  previously 
shown  the  traders  no  hospitality,  he  on  this  occasion 
arranges  a  banquet  to  which  he  invites  the  whole 
caravan  with  an  urgent  request  that  no  one  should 
stay  away.  Naturally  the  Prophet,  as  the  youngest 
of  the  party,  does  not  suppose  himself  to  be  included 
in  the  invitation.  Bahira,  however,  notices  that  the 
cloud  is  over  the  head  of  none  among  the  company, 
and  demands  that  the  young  absentee  be  sent  for  ; 
Mohammed  comes,  and  is  followed  by  the  cloud, 
whereas  the  tree  under  which  he  had  taken  shelter 
pulls  itself  up  by  the  roots.  He  adjures  Mohammed 
by  the  idols  Lat  and  'Uzza  to  answer  certain  questions, 
which  the  Prophet  willingly  answers,  but  declares 
that  he  has  abjured  Lat  and  'Uzza.  Some  Jews 
endeavour  to  enlist  Bahira  in  a  conspiracy  against 
the  life  of  Mohammed,  but  the  monk  ensures  his 
safety. 


250    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

The  only  detail  in  this  narrative  that  is  not  based 
on  the  history  of  Moses  and  of  David  seems  to  be 
that  of  the  tree,  which  figures  rather  more  significantly 
in  the  story  of  the  second  expedition,  where  the 
monk  who  receives  them  bears  the  name  Nestorius. 
The  Prophet  takes  shelter  under  a  tree ;  and  the 
monk  states  that  his  doing  so  is  a  clear  sign  of 
prophecy ;  only  prophets  take  shelter  under  that 
particular  tree.  The  tree  appears  to  be  a  reminiscence 
of  the  fig-tree  in  the  first  chapter  of  St  John,  where, 
however,  it  is  the  convert  Nathanael  who  is  seen 
under  the  fig-tree. 

Mohammed  enters  history  as  the  leader  of  a 
caravan  carrying  the  merchandise  of  the  wealthy 
Khadijah  ;  when  Khadijah  learns  that  Mohammed  is 
willing  to  discharge  this  service,  she  offers  him  twice 
the  fee  which  she  would  have  given  to  anyone  else. 
This  is  a  fiction  somewhat  in  the  style  of  Josephus, 
merely   intended   to  lend  the  transaction  additional 

dignity. 

Every  one  of  these  stories  is  preceded  by  its  chain 
of  authorities,  and  made  to  rest  ultimately  on  the 
assertion  of  someone  who  had  good  opportunities  of 
knowing  the  truth ;  and  Abu  Nu'aim,  concluding 
this  collection  of  anecdotes  deaUng  with  the  Prophet's 
youth  and  infancy,  argues  that  the  miraculous  ele- 
ments which  they  contain  are  sufficient  to  attest  the 
truth  of  the  Prophet's  mission,  especially  if  we  take 
into  account  the  fact  that  he  was  identified  by 
persons  who  were  in  possession  of  a  description,  and 
were  on  the  look-out  for  an  individual  answering  to 


THE   HISTORICAL   SUPPLEMENT  251 

it.  The  Messiah  whom  they  were  expecting  was 
to  have  a  permanent  redness  in  the  eye — a  character- 
istic of  Judah  in  the  Blessing  of  Jacob,  though 
there  ascribed  to  the  effect  of  wine-drinking — a 
weal  between  his  shoulder-blades,  and  certain  other 
peculiarities,  such  as  are  put  by  the  police  into  the 
hands  of  detectives ;  they  detected  the  Prophet  by 
these  marks.  Only,  as  appears  to  be  regularly  the 
case  with  oracles,  people  completely  forgot  that  they 
had  ever  been  given  until  after  they  had  been  fulfilled. 
Nor  does  the  conduct  of  any  contemporary  of  the 
Prophet  appear  to  have  been  at  all  influenced  by  the 
phenomena  which  accompanied  his  presence. 

It  was  obviously  undesirable  that  the  Prophet 
should  at  any  time  of  his  life  have  been  an  idolator, 
and,  as  we  have  seen,  quite  early  in  his  career  he  is 
made  to  repudiate  all  connection  with  the  Meccan 
goddesses.  It  was,  however,  a  question  how  he  could 
have  lived  in  Meccah  for  some  forty  years  and  kept 
aloof  from  the  worships  of  his  countrymen.  Since 
all  feasts  were  idolatrous  services,  he  had  to  be  kept 
away  from  them,  and  indeed  by  supernatural  means. 
When  it  was  his  turn  to  touch  an  idol,  he  felt  a  tall 
man  in  white  garments  intervene  and  tell  him  to 
go  back.  At  other  times  when  he  felt  an  inclination 
to  do  as  the  people  of  Meccah,  he  was  miraculously 
sent  to  sleep. 

There  does  not  appear  to  be  in  these  legends  any 
exact  parallel  to  the  Gospel  narrative  of  the  Temp- 
tation, but  there  are  some  analogues.  When  the 
Prophet  was   prostrating   himself  in  Meccah,   Satan 


252    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

wished  to  tread  upon  his  neck ;  Gabriel  arrived  in 
time  to  blow  Satan  away,  and  indeed  as  far  as  the 
Jordan.  A  more  serious  raid  upon  him  was  made  by 
a  troop  of  demons,  Satan  himself  bearing  a  torch, 
with  which  he  intended  to  burn  the  Prophet ;  this 
time  Gabriel  taught  him  a  spell  which  drove  the 
horde  away.  Mohammed  had  indeed,  like  every 
other  human  being,  a  demon  attached  to  him  ;  he 
was,  however,  able  to  convert  this  inconvenient 
parasite,  and  reduce  him  to  submission. 

In  the  historical  account  of  the  Prophet's  flight 
from  Meccah,  he  escapes  the  attempt  on  his  life  by 
a  mixture  of  cunning,  resolution,  and  daring.  This 
method  might  not  seem  good  enough,  and  therefore 
something  more  worthy  of  the  Prophet  of  God  was 
devised.  When  he  is  informed  that  the  Meccans 
have  conspired  together  to  kill  him  as  soon  as  they 
see  him,  he  comes  forward  boldly ;  their  eyes  droop 
and  their  hands  are  powerless  ;  he  flings  a  handful  of 
pebbles  at  them,  and  all  on  whom  those  pebbles  fall 
are  afterwards  slain  at  Badr.  Various  other  people 
attempt  his  life,  among  them  the  notorious  Abu  Jahl, 
but  are  miraculously  prevented  from  carrying  out 
their  intentions ;  they  seize  stones,  which  stick  to 
their  hands,  or  else  their  hands  wither  in  the  style  of 
Jeroboam's.  Like  Jeroboam  they  have  to  implore 
the  Prophet's  intercession  before  they  can  recover 
the  use  of  their  fingers.  And  lest  Balaam  should 
be  favoured  with  a  miracle  denied  the  Prophet,  an 
animal  is  made  to  talk  for  his  benefit.  When  the 
Prophet  came  back  from  Badr  victorious,  a  Jewess 


THE   HISTORICAL   SUPPLEMENT  253 

met  him  with  a  roast  kid,  which  she  said  she  had 
vowed  to  slaughter  in  the  event  of  his  coming  back 
from  the  expedition  with  triumph ;  but  the  kid  rose 
up  on  its  four  legs  and  said  to  the  Prophet,  "  Eat  me 
not,  I  am  poisoned  !  " 

In  the  Koran  itself  the  Prophet  is  made  to  disclaim 
miracles  on  various  grounds,  chiefly  their  ineffective- 
ness in  producing  belief  among  the  stifFnecked. 
Nevertheless  it  would  be  more  satisfactory  if  the 
demand  had  been  satisfied,  and  the  historical  supple- 
ment satisfies  it  amply.  Like  Hezekiah  the  Meccans 
demand  a  sign  in  heaven,  viz.  the  splitting  of  the  full 
moon  and  its  halves  appearing  on  two  different  hills 
respectively.  This  actually  happens  in  the  presence 
of  the  leading  Meccans,  though  there  is  some  dis- 
crepancy as  to  the  date.  The  Meccans  declare  it  to 
be  sorcery,  i.e.  what  we  should  call  an  optical  illusion, 
and  wish  to  know  whether  anyone  outside  Meccah  has 
seen  the  phenomenon ;  the  next  day  it  is  confirmed 
by  numerous  travellers  who  arrive.  There  is  indeed 
a  reference  to  the  splitting  of  the  moon  in  the  Koran, 
which  appears  to  be  one  of  the  terrors  which  will 
accompany  the  Day  of  Judgment ;  and  though  this 
text  is  probably  the  basis  of  the  story,  the  narrators 
were  probably  also  moved  by  the  desire  to  show  that 
the  Prophet  could  do  as  much  or  more  than  Joshua 
and  Isaiah. 

The  Flight,  or  rather  Migration,  was  the  occasion  of 
numerous  miracles — two  doves  nested  at  the  mouth 
of  the  cave  in  which  the  Prophet  and  his  companion 
had  taken  refuge,  and  a  spider  took  the  opportunity 


254    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

to  spin  its  web  in  the  same  place.  Although,  then, 
professional  trackers  found  their  way  to  this  place  of 
concealment,  they  were  convinced  that  the  cave  had 
not  been  entered.  At  one  point  they  were  nearly 
overtaken  by  a  pursuer  on  horseback ;  but  ere  he 
could  reach  them  the  horse's  legs  sank  down  deep  in 
the  hard  rock.  The  pursuer  was  rescued  from  this 
perilous  plight  by  the  Prophet  on  condition  that  he 
put  the  other  pursuers  off  the  scent.  The  refugees 
alighted  at  a  tent,  where  they  asked  for  milk ;  there 
was  only  an  emaciated  ewe  there,  but  the  Prophet 
prayed,  and  it  produced  copious  milk. 

Of  the  miracles  supposed  to  be  performed  by  the 
Prophet  during  his  residence  at  Medinah  many  took 
the  form  of  healing,  effected  by  his  prayers.  Thus  a 
dumb  child  was  brought  him  ;  he  took  water,  used  it 
for  ablutions,  and  then  gave  it  to  the  child's  mother, 
who  used  it  both  as  a  lotion  and  a  draught ;  by  the 
end  of  a  year  the  child  could  not  only  speak,  but  dis- 
played extraordinary  intelligence.  On  a  journey  he 
met  a  woman  with  a  child  who  was  subject  to  fits  ; 
the  Prophet  spat  into  the  child's  mouth,  and  told  the 
devil  in  possession  of  the  child  to  be  quiet ;  on  the 
return  journey  they  met  the  mother  and  child  in  the 
same  place,  and  were  informed  that  the  fits  had  not 
recurred.  An  even  closer  parallel  to  a  New  Testa- 
ment miracle  is  told  of  a  child  possessed  of  a  devil ; 
the  Prophet  stroked  its  chest,  whereupon  the  child 
vomited,  and  the  demon  came  out  in  the  shape  of  a 
black  cub.  A  man  who  had  lost  his  sight  by  tread- 
ing upon  snake's  eggs  applied  to  the  Prophet  for  a 


THE   HISTORICAL   SUPPLEMENT  255 

cure  ;  this  was  effected  with  spittle,  and  was  so  perfect 
that  the  man  at  the  age  of  eighty  could  thread  his 
own  needles. 

Of  miraculous  supplies  of  food  we  have  already  had 
some  examples ;  there  are  others  which  imitate  the 
precision  of  detail  given  in  the  Gospel  miracle  of 
the  loaves  and  fishes.  The  great  traditionalist  Abu 
Hurairah  was  asked  by  the  Prophet,  apparently  on  a 
journey,  whether  he  had  any  food  ;  he  replied  that  he 
had  some  dates,  to  the  number  of  twenty-seven,  in  a 
wallet.  The  Prophet  bade  him  lay  them  out ;  they 
furnished  a  copious  meal  to  the  company,  and  when  all 
had  been  satisfied  Abu  Hurairah  was  told  to  count 
the  leavings,  restore  them  to  the  wallet,  and  whenever 
he  wanted  a  date  to  put  in  his  hand,  but  by  no  means 
to  empty  out  the  wallet.  Abu  Hurairah  followed 
these  instructions,  and  the  dates  lasted  till  twenty- 
six  years  after  the  Prophet's  death,  when  they  were 
stolen  during  the  siege  of  Othman's  palace.  In  this 
narrative  the  Gospel  miracle  has  been  combined  with 
Elijah's  of  the  widow's  cruse.  A  somewhat  closer 
parallel  to  the  latter  is  recorded  of  the  expedition  to 
Tabuk ;  the  oil  vessel  was  nearly  empty,  when  its 
keeper  fell  asleep  ;  he  woke  to  hear  it  bubbling  in  the 
sun,  and  put  the  cover  on.  Had  he  left  it  alone, 
said  the  Prophet,  the  w^hole  valley  would  have  been 
flowing  with  oil. 

Abu  Hurairah  was  also  the  witness  of  an  occasion 
on  which  a  single  cup  of  milk  served  to  satisfy  all 
the  people  of  the  Suffah  or  mendicant  Moslems  who 
had  no  home  save  the  Mosque  of  Medinah.     Other 


^56   EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

occasions  were  recorded  whereon  the  Prophet  mu^a- 
culously  increased  suppUes  of  water  in  the  desert. 

That  the  tradition  records  apparently  no  occasions 
whereon  the   Prophet   raised  the  dead  is  worthy  of 
notice,  for  this  would  seem  to  be  the  crowning  miracle 
which  ought  not  to  have  been  omitted  in  the  list  of 
his   exploits.     Although   logic    enters   very   slightly 
into  edifying  fabrication  of  the  sort  with  which  w^e 
are  dealing,  there  may  have  been  strong  theological 
reasons  for   abstaining  from  invention  of  this  style. 
The  martyrs  of  the   Holy  War  were  seen  by  the 
Prophet  in  Paradise,  winged  and  happy ;  they  sent 
messages  by  him  expressing  their  satisfaction  with 
their  experiences,  and  it  would  be  evidently  hard  on 
them  that  they  should  be  brought  back  from  the 
Garden  of  Delights.     Further,  it  was  not  claimed  for 
the  Prophet  himself  that  he  rose  from  the  dead,  and 
if  such   resurrection   were   a   privilege,    it   was   un- 
thinkable that  it  should  have  been  accorded  to  others 
and  denied  him.     Besides  this,  the  Moslem  tradition 
deals   almost,    though    not    quite    exclusively,   with 
historical  personages :  people  who  have  parents  and 
children,  who    can  be  located  in  various  ways,  and 
brought  into  connection  with  various  other  historical 
personages.     The  Prophet  could  not  well  be  made  to 
restore  any  of  these  to  life  ;  on  the  other  hand,  had 
he  exercised  this  power  at  all,  he  could  not  well  have 
failed  to  practise  it  on  such  heroes  as  Hamzah,  or  his 
own  son  Ibrahim.     Hence  the  miracle-mongers  have 
wisely  kept  to  incidents  which  did  not  really  affect 
the  course   of  history  ;   for  no  one  could  say   how 


THE   HISTORICAL   SUPPLEMENT  257 

often  the  people  of  the  SufFah  had  to  go  without 
dinner  or  whence  in  any  particular  case  they  had 
procured  it,  nor  did  the  Prophet's  commissariat 
department  keep  any  record  of  supplies  and  expendi- 
ture during  the  campaigns.  The  belief  that  hosts  of 
angels  fought  on  his  side  was  wisely  encouraged  by 
the  Prophet ;  for  while  it  added  glory  to  his  victories 
it  minimised  the  disgrace  of  the  defeated  ;  but  it  is 
clear  that  he  never  counted  on  the  aid  of  these  angels 
for  any  actual  fighting,  and  he  was  probably  far  too 
cautious  to  attempt  any  miracle  where  failure  might 
prove  compromising.  What  we  learn  from  the 
Dalail  al-Nubuwwah  is,  then,  nothing  that  is  of  value 
for  the  biography  of  the  Prophet,  but  the  effect  which 
familiarity  with  Jews  and  Christians  had  perforce  on 
the  idea  of  a  prophet  as  conceived  by  Moslem  minds. 
Similarly,  when  the  Moslems,  owing  to  Arabic  trans- 
lations of  the  Bible,  had  learned  the  nature  of 
the  Old  and  New  Testaments,  they  strove  to  show 
that  the  Koran  in  its  different  parts  contained  the 
analogue  of  the  various  parts  of  the  older  Scriptures  : 
one  part  corresponded  with  the  Law,  another  with 
the  Psalms,  another  with  the  Gospel.  Somewhat 
similarly,  the  Jewish  Moses  of  renaissance  times 
derives  many  a  trait  from  the  Prophet  Mohammed ; 
and  when  a  few  years  ago  a  Jesuit  writer  on  rhetoric 
in  Arabic  quoted  Almighty  God  for  rhetorical  figures, 
he  was  certainly .  under  the  influence  of  his  Moslem 
environment;  the  degree  of  sanctity  assigned  the 
Bible  by  a  Christian  ought  not  to  fall  short  of  that 

which   the  Mohammedan  assigns  the  Koran.     If  a 

17 


258    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 

'  prophet  and  Messiah  was  a  miracle-worker,  and  this 
was  attested  for  the  Christian  Messiah  by  the  Koran 
itself,  the  seal  of  the  prophets  ought  clearly  to  be 
able  to  show  as  lengthy  and  striking  a  record  in  this 
matter  as  the  greatest  of  his  predecessors ;  and,  as 
we  have  seen,  that  has  on  the  whole  been  made  out. 
If  Mohammed  fell  short  on  any  one  point,  he  com- 
pensated for  it  by  the  number  and  importance  of  his 
other  exploits. 

In  the  development  of  a  religion  fiction  has  scarcely 
less  importance  than  fact.  In  order  to  understand 
the  rise  of  Islam  it  is  necessary  to  be  acquainted 
with  the  historical  Mohammed — the  man  of  extreme 
caution  and  extreme  intrepidity :  who  made  by  force 
his  merit  known:  who  gauged  with  exactitude  the 
intellect  and  the  character  of  his  associates  and  his 
adversaries  ;  for  whom  every  fortress  had  its  key  and 
every  man  his  price :  whom  no  opportunity  escaped, 
no  scruple  deterred,  and  no  emergency  found  un- 
prepared. But  for  the  continuance  and  development 
of  the  system  probably  the  fictitious  Mohammed  was 
the  more  significant :  the  legislator,  the  saint,  and  the 
thaumaturge. 


INDEX 

[Dates  in  brackets  are  given  a.d.     Arabic  words  interpreted 

are  in  italics.] 


'Abbas,  uncle  of  the  Prophet,  238. 

'Abbasid  dynasty,  named  after  the 
above,  67,  70.     See  Caliph. 

'Abdallah  Ibn  'Abbas,  son  of  the 
above,  138. 

'Abdallah  Ibn  'Amr(son  of  the  con- 
queror of  Egypt),  read  the  book 
of  Daniel,  41  ;  possessed  a 
"  Veracious  Scroll,"  65. 

'Abdallah  Ibn  Nauf,  excused  a  falsi- 
fied prophecy,  10. 

'Abdal-Wahid  Ibn  Zaid, mystic,  154. 

Abraham,  reproved  for  praying  for 
his  father,  29,  47  ;  resemblance 
of  his  foot  to  the  Prophet's, 
247  ;  his  Roll,  234. 

Abrogation  of  commands  and  doc- 
trines, 24,  38,  48,  50,  76-78,  93. 

yi^/7,  "father  of." 

Abu  Bakr,  father-in-law  of  the  Pro- 
phet and  his  first  successor,  24  ; 
composes  a  Koranic  text,  38  ; 
collects  the  Koran,  24  ;  deprives 
the  Prophet's  daughter  of  her 
inheritance,  59  ;  his  right  to  the 
succession  proved  by  a  pro- 
phetic statue,  242. 

Abu'l-Darda  (t652),  Companion  of 
the  Prophet,  87. 

Abu  Hanifah  (700-767),  first  founder 
of  a  law  school,  113,  120. 

Abu'l-Hasan  al-Ash'arl  (873-935),  at 
first  a  Mu'tazil,  was  commanded 
by  the  Prophet  in  a  dream  to 
write  books  in  favour  of  ortho- 
doxy, 219;  his  treatise,  the 
IddnaA,3.ma.nua.\  of  theopinions 
ultimately  accepted  as  ortho- 
dox, 205. 


Abu'l-Hudhail  al-'Allaf  (tabout  830), 
Mu'tazilite  doctor,  proves  that 
the  Unbeliever  obeys  a  divine 
command,  222  ;  requires  twenty 
witnesses  for  a  tradition,  228. 

Abii  Hurairah  (t678).  Companion 
of  the  Prophet,  traditionalist, 
witnessed  a  miracle,  255. 

Abii  Jahl,  enemy  of  Mohammed, 
252. 

Abii  Nu'aim  (942-1038),  his  collec- 
tion of  miracles  demonstrating 
the  genuineness  of  Moham- 
med's mission,  241-250. 

Abu  Talib,  uncle  and  protector  of 
Mohammed,  248. 

Abu  Talib  al-Mekkl  (t996),  author 
of  the  A'??/  al-  Kulub^  Siifi 
treatise,  excerpted  in  Lecture  V. 
Quoted  90,  234,  etc. 

Adam,  his  collection  of  prophetic 
portraits,  242. 

Adana,  massacre  of,  114. 

Ahmad  =  Mohammed,  237,  243,  245. 

Ahmad  Ibn  Hanbal  (780-855), 
founder  of  a  law  school,  168. 

Ahmad  Ibn  'Isa  al-Kharraz  (t899), 
rebuked  for  his  erotic  hymns, 
177. 

'A'ishah,  daughter  of  Abu  Bakr,  and 
wife  of  Mohammed,  slandered, 
78  ;  defended  by  a  revelation, 
14,  162  ;  wars  with  Ali,  212, 
240. 

Alexandrian  library,  39. 

'All,  cousin  and  son-in-law  of  the 
Prophet,  and  his  fourth  suc- 
cessor, held  to  be  an  incarnation 
of  the  Deity,  209  ;  his  political 


259 


260    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 


incompetence,  20 ;  see  also 
65,  88,  102,  105,  113,  212,  219, 
240. 

Aminah,  mother  of  the  Prophet, 
246. 

'Ammar  Ibn  Yasir  (t657),  Com- 
panion of  the  Prophet,  240. 

'Amr  Ibn  Umayyah,  Companion  of 
the  Prophet,  93. 

Analogy,  use  of  by  Shafi'I  illustrated, 

97- 
Anas,     servant     of    the     Prophet, 

171. 
"Ancient  House,"  i.e.  the  Ka'bah, 

supposed  to  be  the  first  house 

built,  50. 
Arabian  Jews  and  Christians  treated 
'  as  renegades  from  the  religion 

of  Abraham,  105. 
Aristotle,  traces  of  his  thought  in 

the   Koran,  206  ;  works  of  his 

studied     by     Moslems,     207  ; 

charged  with  plagiarism  from 

Arabs,  225. 
'Ata  Ibn  Abi  Rabah  (tabout  710), 

introduced  music  into  devotion, 

178. 
Atonement  for  oaths,  61. 
Attestation  of  traditions,  rules  for, 

84. 
Avicenna  (ti037),  philosopher,  205. 

Badr,  battle  of,  first  victory  won  by 

the  Prophet,  48,  107,  252. 
Baghdad,  focus  of  Islamic  thought, 

208  ;  43,  127. 
Bahira,  Christian  monk,  249. 
Baibars,  Emir,  124. 
Baibars      (i  260-1 277),      Mamluke 

Sultan,  126. 
Barkuk      (i  382-1 398),       Mamluke 

Sultan,  128. 
Bashans,   festival    of  first    day   of, 

128. 
Begging,      discouraged      by      the 

Prophet,     169  ;     practised     by 

Sijfis,  ibid. 
Bible,  supposed  to  be  falsified,  53, 

87 ;    spurious    substitutes    for, 

233- 
BistamI,    Abu   Yazld    (about    776- 

'  873),  mystic,  170. 
Blood-money,  amount  of  for  differ- 
ent persons,  81,  94,  112,  113. 


Blood-thirst,  a  result  of  early 
Islamic  teaching,  58. 

Bonaparte,  41. 

Books,  nature  of,  in  ancient  times, 
8  ;  all  save  the  Koran  super- 
fluous, 40,  43,  88. 

Butrus  Pasha,  114. 

Caliphs,  or  successors  of  the 
Prophet ;  reference  is  made  to 
the  following:  (ist  Dynasty, 
Pious  Caliphs)  \.  Abu  Bakr, 
632-634  ;  ii.  Omar  I,,  634-644  ; 
iii.  Othman,  644-656;  iv.  Ali, 
656-661  ;  (2nd  Dynasty,  Um- 
ayyads)  i.  Mu'awiyah,  661-680  ; 
ii.  Yazid  I.,  680-683  ;  viii.  Omar 
II.,  717-720;  X.  Hisham,  724- 
743  ;  xii.  Yazid  III.,  744  ;  (3_rd 
Dynasty,  Abbasids)  ii.  Mansiir, 
754-775  ;  X.  Mutawakkil,  847- 
861. 

Carmathians,  a  sect  charged  with 
atheism,  217. 

Casuistry,  Moslem  and  Jewish  com- 
pared, 96. 

Chakmah  (1438-1453),  Mamluke 
Sultan  of  Egypt,  126. 

Chastity,  Moslem,  63. 

Christian  churches,  Moslem  law 
concerning,  124. 

Christian  elements  in  Sufi  sermons, 

143- 

Christians  and  Jews,  1,9,  in,  113, 
237  ;  their  position  under  Mos- 
lem rule.  Lecture  IV. ;  manage 
much  of  the  business  of  the 
community,  117,  122,  130; 
their  debates  with  Moslems, 
225. 

Classes  of  community,  three,  183. 

Coins,  Moslem,  ought  not  to  be  used 
by  Unbelievers,  119. 

Commandments,    Koranic    list    of, 

47. 

"  Companions "  of  the  Prophet, 
i.e.  believing  contemporaries, 
authorities  for  his  sayings  and 
doings,  Lecture  III.;  their 
wealth,  136. 

Creation  of  the  Koran,  controversy 
about,  211,  222. 

DalaHl  al-Nubuwivah  ("  Evidences 
of  the  Mission  of  Mohammed"), 


INDEX 


261 


treatise  by  Abu  Nu'aim,  ex- 
cerpted in  Lecture  VIII. 

Daniel,  studied  by  Moslems,  41  ; 
copied  pictures  of  prophets 
from  Adam's  gallery,  242. 

Debates,  legal,  92, 93 ;  philosophical, 
215. 

Demons  converted  by  the  Prophet, 
244. 

Dhirmnah  ("covenant"),  name 
used  for  status  of  protected 
communities,  116. 

Dogs,  property  in,  97^ 

Elements,  hierarchy  of,  206, 
Esoteric  interpretation  of  the  Koran, 

possessed     by     the     Prophet's 

family,  18. 
Etiquette,  elaborated  by  Siifis,  155. 
Euclid,   study    of,    discouraged    by 

the  ultra-orthodox,  207. 
Ezra,  175. 

Fanci  ("annihilation"),  technical 
term  of  Siifis,  199. 

Fasting,  produces  literal  purity,  153, 
248  ;  SiTifi  theories  of,  151  ff. 

Fatalism  in  the  Koran,  46,  170,  172, 
214,  221. 

Fatimah,  daughter  of  Mohammed 
and  wife  of  Ali,  20,  241. 

Fikh^  originally  "  knowledge,"  after- 
wards specialised  as  jurispru- 
dence, 72. 

Foods,  forbidden,  Koranic  enact- 
ments concerning,  45. 

Friday  worship,  myths  connected 
with,  165  ;  cursing  at,  217. 

Ghailan  (+743),  heresiarch,  executed 
by  Hisham,  210. 

Ghassanides,  Christian  Arabs  pro- 
tected by  the  Byzantines,  245. 

Gnosis,  term  taken  over  by  Sufis, 
144,  190. 

Gospel,  Fourth,  analogy  of  to 
Sufism,  200. 

Greek  thought,  influence  of,  145, 
153,  206,  212,  220-223. 

Hajjaj  Ibn  Yusuf  (t7i3),  Umayyad 
governor  of 'Irak,  first  to  use  a 
litter  on  pilgrimage,  and  one  of 
the  lost,  159. 


Hakim  (996-1020),  Fatimid  Caliph, 
persecutes  Christians,  etc.,  132. 

Hallaj  (t922),  mystic,  author  of  an 
infantile  work,  181. 

Hamzah,  uncle  of  the  Prophet,  256. 

Hanifite  (  =  Moslem)  faith,  105. 

Hariri  (1054-1122),  author  of  the 
Makamahs,  "licensed"  seven 
hundred  copies  of  his  work,  8. 

Hasan  (1357-1351  and  1354-1361), 
Mamluke  Sultan,  128. 

Hassan  Ibn  Thabit  (tabout  670), 
court-poet  to  Mohammed,  243  j 
his  poems  preserved  in  writing 
at  Medinah,  89. 

Hau'ab,  station  on  the  desert  road 
from  Medinah  to  Basrah,  240. 

Hell-Fire,  doom  of  one  who  kills  a 
Believer,  213,  221  ;  Siifi  con- 
tempt for,  148,  172,  179. 

"  Helpers,"  Mohammed's  Medinese 
converts,  19,  84. 

Heraclius  (610-642),  Byzantine 
Emperor,  supposed  to  have 
preserved  the  Prophet's  letter, 
103. 

Hijrah.     See  Migration. 

Hisham  (724  -  743),  Umayyad 
Caliph,  no,  117,  210. 

History,  Islamic,  beginnings  of,  41. 

Honour  of  protected  communities 
not  ordinarily  defended,  112. 

Humility,  Sufi  definition  of,  171. 

Humours  of  the  body,  supposed 
to  be  mentioned  in  the  Old 
Testament,  153. 

Hunain,  battle  of,  49. 

Husain,  grandson  of  the  Prophet, 
slain  at  Kerbela,  56 ;  avenged, 
60,  72. 

Iblls,  Arabic  corruption  of  Diabolos 

through   the    Syriac,  182,   186, 

226. 
Ib7i^  plural  Baml,  "  son." 
Ibn     'Arab!     (i  165-1240),     mystic, 

176,  188. 
Ibn    Ishak    (+767),   earliest    extant 

biographer  of  the  Prophet,  237. 
Ibn   Mas'ud  (t652),  interpreter  of 

the  Koran,  171. 
Ibn    Suraij,   earliest    author    of    a 

code,  91. 
Ibn    Zubair,    'Abdallah,    held    the 

sacred     cities     (683-692)     as 


262    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 


independent     Caliph     against 

the  Umayyads,  58  ;  persuades 

his  father   to   perjure    himself 

and  make  atonement,  60. 
Ibrahim,  son    of  Mohammed   who 

died  in  infancy,  256. 
Ibrahim       Ibn       Adham       (t777), 

mystic,  1 76  ;  invents  a  form  of 

prayer,  165. 
Idrls,      prophet      identified      with 

Enoch,  165. 
Inheritance,   between   members   of 

different  sects  or  religions,  loi. 
"  Inquisition,"   persecution    started 

by     Caliph     Ma'miin     in     the 

interests  of  Mu'tazilism,  168. 
Islam,  more  political  than  religious, 

142,  229;   obligations  of,  183; 

its  general  character,  50  ff. 

Ja'far,  son  of  Abu  Talib,  the  hero 
of  Mutah  (first  battle  between 
Moslems  and  Byzantines),  177. 

Jahiz  (t869),  important  Arabic 
author,  his  Zoology  described, 
225  ;  his  ignorance  of  the 
Bible,  235. 

Jews,  their  status  under  Islam, 
Lecture  IV.  ;  their  influence 
on  Islamic  jurisprudence,  74  ; 
dealers  in  arms  and  armour, 
109 ;  their  supposed  witness 
to  Mohammed's  mission,  244, 
247. 

Jinn,  superstitions  about,  confirmed 
by  the  philosopher  Jahiz,  226. 

Joseph,  brethren  of,  175. 

Joshua,  a  Jew  of  Medinah,  243. 

Jubair  Ibn  Mut'im,  contemporary  of 
the  Prophet,  241. 

Junaid  (t9io),  mystic,  163. 

Kadarls  =  Mu'tazils. 

Kerbela.     See  Husain. 

Khadljah,  first  wife  of  Mohammed, 

250. 
Khaibar,  last  Jewish  settlement  in 

Arabia  taken  by  Mohammed, 

107. 
Khaithamah  (t7oo),    interpreter  of 

the  Koran,  234. 
Kharijis  or  Khawarij  =  professional 

rebels,    i.e.    believers    in    the 

doctrine  that  an  evil-doer  is  an 

Unbeliever,  whence  an  unjust 


sovereign    may    be    deposed, 
massacred      Moslem      women 
and  children,  but  spared  Jews 
and  Christians,  59,  209,  213. 
Koraizah,  Jewish  tribe  at  Medinah, 

243. 

Koran,  meaning  of  the  name,  9,  12  ; 
delivered  orally,  33  ;  collection 
of,  25-28,  32,43  ;  official  edition 
of,  36 ;  reasons  for  believing 
its  genuineness,  33  ;  com- 
mentaries on,  8,  21  ;  ritual 
and  liturgical  use  of,  15,  21, 
31  ;  Siifi  affection  for,  178. 

Kufah,  obtains  university  rank  after 
Medinah,  'j-^^  ;  earliest  seat  of 
asceticism,  146  ;  a  grandson  of 
Iblis  lived  there,  226. 

Land-tax,  case  in  which  the  land 
is  sold  by  a  Dhiinmi  to  a 
Moslem,  119. 

Al-Lat  and  Al-'Uzza,  Arabian  god- 
desses or  "houses,"  249,  251. 

Law,  Moslem,  its  sources  and 
development,  Lectures  III.  and 
IV. 

Legacies,  law  of,  ^"j . 

Letters,  the  Prophet's,  quoted,  66  ; 
not  preserved  or  collected,  20. 

Love  of  God,  Sufi  theories  concern- 
ing, 175  ;  excludes  all  other 
affection,  179, 

Maghrib  ("the  West"),  i.e.  Africa 
West  of  Egypt,  91  ;  adjective 
Maghribi,  123. 

Mahdi  ("the  guided  one"),  a 
Messiah  looked  for  from  the 
Prophet's  family,  often  thought 
to  be  in  concealment,  18. 

Malik  Ibn  Anas  (715-801),  jurist  of 
Medinah,  first  compiler  of  a 
body  of  tradition,  his  legal 
opinions,  called  Mudawwandt., 
frequently  cited  in  Lectures 
III.  and  IV. 

Mansur  (see  Caliph),  tried  an  ex- 
periment with  a  conjurer,  227  ; 
letter  of  his  wherein  the  Koran 
is  misquoted,  90,  238. 

Marriage  with  members  of  tolerated 
cults  permitted  to  Moslem  man, 
but   not  to   woman,  102  :    in- 


INDEX 


263 


cestuous  marriages  prohibited, 

112. 

Martyrdom  in  Islam  different  from 
Christian,  2  ;  desired,  57. 

Martyrs,  their  state  in  Paradise, 
216  ;  256. 

Matter,  question  of  its  eternity,  221. 

Maxims  of  Islam :  Islam  cancels 
all  that  was  before  it,  2,  230  ; 
Believer  shall  not  be  slain  for 
Unbeliever,  65,  81,  113  ;  whoso 
obeys  the  Prophet  obeys  God, 
72. 

Mazdak  (t529),  communist,  socialist, 
and  vegetarian,  141. 

Mazdians  =  Zoroastrians,  their  status 
in  Islam,  105,  112  ;  debate  with 
Moslems,  225  ;  their  name 
given  to  the  Mu'tazils  by  the 
orthodox,  214,  224. 

Meccah,  evil  thoughts  penalised 
there,  161  ;  costliness  of  living 
there,  though  rent  might  not 
be  taken  for  houses,  ibid. 

Medicine,  disapproved  of  by  Sufis, 
156. 

Medinah,  home  of  Islamic  juris- 
prudence, 73. 

Melkite  ("belonging  to  the  Greek 
orthodox  Church"),  125. 

Memories  of  traditionalists,  weak, 

79- 

Migration  or  Flight  of  Mohammed, 

the   beginning    of   history   for 


Moslems, 


II  ;     myths     con- 


nected with,  253. 

Miracles  of  the  Prophet,  Lecture 
VIII. 

Missions  to  Christians  under  Mos- 
lem rule,  106. 

Moderation,  characteristic  of  Kor- 
anic doctrine,  62,  163. 

Mohammed,  pattern  of  conduct,  54, 
61  ;  his  admirable  character  in 
legend,  238  ;  never  complained, 
171  ;  cannot  be  personified  by 
Satan  in  dreams,  219.  See 
especially  Lectures  I.,  II.,  and 
VIII. 

Moses,  185. 

Moslems  take  part  in  Christian 
feasts,  127.     See  Islam. 

Mosques,  entrance  of  forbidden  to 
Unbelievers,  i  ;  used  as  de- 
bating rooms,  41,  215,  227. 


"  Mother  of  the  Book,"  divine 
archetype  of  the  Koran,  38, 209. 

Mu'awiyah,  his  war  with  Ali,  re- 
ferred to,  52,  139.     See  Caliph. 

Mukaukis,  Moslem  name  for  the 
Byzantine  governor  of  Egypt, 
244. 

Mukhtar (t687),  political  adventurer, 
plays  the  part  of  prophet,  17, 
56,  82  ;  avenges  the  death  of 
Husainby  wholesale  massacres, 
60. 

Murjis,  sect  who  held  that  faith  took 
precedence  of  works,  224. 

Music,  use  of  by  Sufis,  177. 

Mutawakkil,  Caliph,  enforces  ordin- 
ance of  Omar,  121  ff. 

Mu'tazils,  "neutrals"  or  "separat- 
ists," become  prominent  in 
the  Umayyad  period,  213  ; 
believed  in  the  freedom  of  the 
will,  and  had  little  respect  for 
tradition,  210,  212,  219. 

Mysticism  of  Islam,  different  from 
other  forms.  Lectures  V.,  VI. 

Nazzam  (tabout  840),  Mu'tazilite 
doctor,  228. 

Nestorius,  monk  who  plays  a  part 
in  the  Prophet's  biography,  250. 

Niffarl,  Mohammed  Ibn  'Abd  al- 
Jabbar  (t354),  author  of  the 
Mawakif^  mystic  treatise  de- 
scribed in  Lecture  VI.,  188-200. 

Oaths,  Moslem,  can  be  cancelled, 

48,    60  ;    those    of   Jews    and 

Christians  accepted  in  certain 

cases.  III;  may  be  exacted  of 

defendant,  82. 
Omar  I.,  his  copy  of  the  Koran,  25, 

36  ;  his  instructions  to  a  judge, 

90,    See  "  Ordinance." 
Omar  II.,  his  rulings  on  the  subject 

of  taxes,  115;  of  churches,  120  ; 

of  etiquette,  155;   of  heretics, 

210. 
Oral  tradition,  67,  84  ;  alone  valued, 

87  ;  ridiculed,  83. 
Ordinance  of  Omar,  explained,  118  ; 

its  enforcement,  118-125. 
Othman,   third    Caliph,  called   the 

"Tearer  of  the  Books,"  37  ;  his 

recension   of  the    Koran,   36 ; 

his  unpopularity,  138  ;  siege  of 


264    EARLY  DEVELOPMENT  OF  MOHAMMEDANISM 


his  palace,  255  ;  murdered,  37, 
52  ;  enactments  during  his 
reign,  82,  93. 
Othman,  founder  of  the  Ottoman 
empire,  described  in  the  Hesht 
Bihisht^  104. 

Pantheism,  source  of  Islamic,  Lec- 
ture VI. 

Paradise,  its  character  in  the  Koran, 
135,  180  ;  entered  by  martyrs 
immediately  after  death,  202  ; 
Sufi  reaction  from  to  a  higher 
ideal,  145. 

Penalties  for  abandoning  Islam,  2  ; 
for  adultery,  iZ  ;  for  murder  of 
a  Jew  or  Christian,  93,  113; 
for  theft,  III,  228;  for  wine- 
drinking,  82. 

"  Penitents,"  the,  56. 

Perfume,  use  of,  164. 

Persecution  of  Moslem  heretics,2io- 
212,  217;  of  Jews  and  Chris- 
tians, Lecture  IV. 

Philosophy,  Moslem,  origins  of 
political,  212. 

Pickthall,  M.,  quoted,  127. 

Pilgrimage,  Siifi  sublimation  of,  159. 

"  Pillars  of  Islam,"  i.e.  the  Creed, 
Prayer,  the  Fast  of  Ramadan, 
Alms,  and  the  Pilgrimage,  51. 

Poetry,  employment  of  by  Sufis,  177. 

Poverty,  Siifi  cultivation  of,  168. 

Practice.     See  Sunnah. 

Prayer,  Sufi  treatment  of,  148. 

Property  of  enemies,  law  concern- 
ing, 136. 

Prophets,  equality  of,  17,  235. 

Proselytism,  Islamic,  by  the  sword, 
3  ;  examples  of  other  methods, 
132,  133- 

Rabl'ah   'Adwiyyah,    woman   saint, 

her  verses,  175. 
Ramadan,  the  fasting  month,  127, 

150-152,  178. 
"  Readers,"  i.e.  of  the  Koran,  56  ; 

identified  with  the  Kharijis,  37. 
"  Refugees,"  Meccans  who  migrated 

with  Mohammed,  19,  84. 
Resignation,  Siifi  notion  of,  172. 

Saba'is,  sect  who  held  that  Moham- 
med would  reappear,  209. 
Sacrifice,  rules  concerning,  160, 


Sa'd  the  copyist,  131. 

Sahib  Ibn  'Abbad  (936-995),  famous 

minister  and  scholar,  a  Mu'tazil, 

217. 
Sahl  al-Tustari  (815-896),  Sufi,  90, 

156. 
Saints,  cult  of,  54,  125  ;  their  con- 
duct a   recognised   subject   of 

study,  139,  142,  146,  166. 
Saldt.,     plural     salawdt,     Moslem 

prayer,  147. 
Satlh,  wizard,  245. 
Schools  of  law,  97,  107. 
Science,  natural,  in  the  Koran,  203. 
"  Scroll,"  the  Veracious,  65. 
Sea,  mystic  passage  about,  198. 
Sects,    "people   of   fancies,"    208  ; 

their   origin,   209  ;    their  legal 

status,  211. 
Seljuk  empire,  104,  217. 
"Servant  of  the   Lord"   in   Isaiah 

interpreted  of  Mohammed,  235. 
Shabib  (t696),  insurgent,  his  hard 

heart,  204. 
Shafi'r,  Mohammed  Ibn  Idrls  (767- 

820),  founded  the  science  called 

Principles  of  Jurisprudence,  40; 

his  treatise,  called  the    Urnin^ 

described  in  Lectures  III.  and 

IV. 
Shifa,  mother  of  a  Companion,  246. 
ShI'ites,     partisans     of     Ali     and 

his    descendants,    58 ;    accept 

Othman's  Koran,  218. 
Sickness,  Sufi  appreciation  of,  155. 
Siffin,  battle   of  (37  a.h.)  between 

Ali  and  Mu'awiyah,  240. 
Sinai,  churches  on,  125. 
Sirri   Sakati   (tabout  865),  mystic, 

I73-' 
Slavery,  name  applied  to  status  of 

tolerated      cults,      100 ;      rare 

example  of  disapproval  of,  223. 

Slaves,  manumission  of,  a  virtuous 
act,  78,  137,  165  ;  a  non- 
Moslem  may  not  have  a 
Moslem  slave,  1 15. 

State  paper  inserted  in  Koran,  33. 

Suffah^  people  of  the,  humble 
followers  of  the  Prophet  in 
Medinah,  255,  257. 

.5'??^= "  wearer  of  wool,"  141;  few 
notices  of  them  till  x^-bbasid 
times,  139,  142  ;  exaggerate 
the    performances    prescribed 


INDEX 


265 


in  the  Koran,  Lecture  V.  ;  pro- 
ceed to  pantheism  from  the 
first  article  of  the  Mohammedan 
creed,  Lecture  VL 

Sufyan  Thauri  (t777),  early  jurist, 
80. 

Sunnah^  plural  sunan,  "  the  beaten 
track,"  originally  the  custom 
of  the  community,  gradually 
interpreted  as  the  practice  of 
the  Prophet,  66,  69-71,  75-98. 

Sunnites,  orthodox  Moslems  who 
recognise  the  legitimacy  of  the 
first  three  Caliphs,  220. 

Tabarl  (838-923),  historian  and 
commentator,  21,  25,  56,  68, 
etc. 

Tabuk,  Mohammed's  expedition 
to,  255. 

Tawasm,  treatise  of  Hallaj,  182. 

Thomas,  Acts  of,  matter  taken 
from  by  Siifis,  144. 

Thumamah  Ibn  al-Ashras  (fabout 
825),  philosopher  who  dis- 
approved of  slavery,  223. 

Travels  of  traditionalists,  84. 

Trench,  battle  of,  32. 

Tribal  narratives,  41. 

Tribute  {jizyaJi)  from  merhbers  of 
tolerated  cults,  84,  99,  100, 
105,  140. 

'Ubaidallah  b.  al-Hasan,  philoso- 
pher whoheldthatcontradictory 
opinions  might  be  right,  221. 

'Ubaidallah  b.  Ziyad  (t686), 
Umayyad  governor   of  Kufah 


who  sent  forces  against  Husain, 
61  ;  employed  Persian  tax- 
collectors,  130. 

Uhud,  battle  of,  14,  31. 

Unbelievers,  question  of  their 
identity  with  evil-doers,  221. 

'Utbah,  mystic,  154. 

Vicinity,  technicality  of  the  higher 
Siifism,  192. 

Wahb  Ibn  Munabbih  (t77o),  cited 

for    fanciful    accounts    of    the 

Bible,  154. 
Wakfah^  "understanding,"  highest 

stage  of  pantheism,  188. 
Wealth,  of  the   Companions,    136; 

not  discouraged  by  the  Koran, 

135. 
"  Wisdom  "  in  the  Koran  identified 

with  the  Sunnah^  68. 
Writing  of  any  book  save  the  Koran 

forbidden,  67. 
Written  documents  suspected,  %']. 

Yazid  L,  72,  117. 
Yazid  IIL,  211. 

Yemamah,  campaign  of  shortly 
after  the  Prophet's  death,  6. 

Zachariah,  221. 

Zaid,  adopted  son  of  Mohammed, 
whose  wife  Zainab  was  taken 
by  the  Prophet,  14,  49. 

Zoology  of  Jahiz  described,  225. 

Zubair,  cousin  of  the  Prophet,  60, 
240. 


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